Legendary Three
by Moonlit-Arrow
Summary: Everyone's born with spirit animals... except for the three people who are born to fuse with the souls of three creatures straight from Hell. Should they work together, they could destroy the known universe. (Rated M for gore and way too much blood.)
1. Prologue

{~ This entire story was written a year ago, Chapter 3 had just come out so it does not at all follow cannon. It shaped my writing into longer than it was before and, believe it or not, the reason I started an account... and I'm just now posting it. This was my attempt at horror, did I succeed? ~}

* * *

Prologue

( _ **warning: suicide briefly mentioned later on**_ )

It was years and years ago, perhaps centuries past, when it was discovered that there was a way to find a person's spirit animal. And now, it has been perfected.

Still, there were people who were...different. Their spirit animals were not normal at all, impossible to classify.

There were three of them. One easily mistaken and usually not found until it was too late. The other two, nothing came close to theirs, they matched no known species. And if they were not found in time, they were dangerous. The spirits were powerful creatures, whatever they were, and if working together with the human as a spirit is meant to, the world could be at their _mercy_.

.~.~.~.

"It's been 60 years since the last time you and I caused some trouble, old friend," the old man choked out as he lay, reclining on his deathbed.

"Aw, really? Gosh, it feel like it was jus' yesterday," the spirit replied. "Too bad we never found the others, imagine the fun we coulda had with them on our side!"

The man's smile widened. "Well, I guess that's something for you to look forward to when you are reborn with a new person," he commented. "Bendy, promise me you'll never forget the fun we had in our life together?"

The spirit that only he could see smiled excitedly himself. "Of course, pal! I never forget a past!"

It was later that night when the old man passed on. Around that same time, a child was born, the child who would be the next human for the spirit known simply as Bendy, for their kind was different from normal animals. Unlike normal spirit animals, their kind reincarnates with a new person each time the last one died.

"Hey, little buddy," Bendy whispered to the baby, ghosting around the room so he could see the child. This young, it was okay to make his presence known, when the baby was old enough to remember things, then he had to disappear. "We're gonna have all kinds of fun t'gether, aren't we, lil' Joseph?"

The baby boy looked at him, acknowledging his appearance, before falling asleep again in his mother's arms.

"Aww, how cute!" the mother cooed.

"Little guy's already tuckered out," the father laughed.

.~.~.~.

Elsewhere, things were less then pleasant, footsteps echoed down the metallic hallway as the bare feet raced through.

"Left -no, right- no, left!- no..."

"Boris," the middle aged man groaned. His eyes landed on a sign. "Found her!" he stated, racing towards the sign until he arrived at the heavy, metal door he had been in search of.

"Alice?" he asked, whispering into the door. He and the woman only knew each other by the spirits' names. In fact, the woman and the spirit were fused now, the spirit living as the woman and becoming the her completely. "Alice, you there?"

"Boris?" came a feminine voice from the other side of the door. "How did you escape?"

"I knocked a guard out and ran," the man explained, fumbling with the keys to get the door open. "Now, hang on, I'll get you out and we can blow this joint!"

No sooner had the door opened, a voice boomed through the hallway. "Don't let them get away!" a guard captain bellowed.

The two left the room and fled, heading straight for where they thought the exit was. Sadly, they were wrong. They did, however, succeed in finding a dead end to trap themselves in.

"Remember," the guard captain said as he and a small army of armed soldiers approached them. "We need them alive. We're already trying to track the last one, the last thing we need is to lose the two we already have."

The two had been captured a long time ago, the woman when she was a young girl and the man when he was early twenties and wreaking havoc on a nearby town. People had been curious about the girl but never suspected the seemingly normal young man. Now they were both middle aged and tired of being trapped so they couldn't cause trouble.

.~.~.~.

A few years later, the woman was found in her room, a rope around her neck. If she couldn't run free herself, the least she could do was set the spirit free in a new body.

The man stayed put for a few months, almost a full year, mourning her appropriately before he stole the gun from a guard and shot himself with it, setting the spirit free as well.

In their efforts to keep them, the people had lost them. And now, they may never get them back.


	2. Failing Sessions

"How'd it go?"

Joey limped out of the confrontation room, hand trembling slightly on his crutch that he used to keep his weak leg stable. "What do you think?" he asked with a sigh. "Still no change from last time." He fell into a chair in the hallway, the one next to his friend, Henry, and sighed again. "How hard can it be to detect a spirit animal anyway? They figured out yours first try!"

"Yeah, well, mine was easy," Henry replied. He leaned back with a smile. "Don't worry too much, Joey, it's actually fairly common that it takes a while for them to figure it out, they want to be sure."

"I guess you're right," Joey agreed, albeit bitterly.

The confrontation rooms were small, peaceful rooms at the end of a hallway with chairs lining it, another doorway opening into a peaceful waiting room. There were several other students who's day it was to attempt to find their spirit animals, a lot of them were younger students.

One of the assistants stepped out of a room and called for a girl, who promptly came out of the waiting room and slinging her backpack over her shoulder again. The girl, Susie as the woman called her, waved excitedly to the assistant. Susie was well known throughout the school for being one of the nicest kids in the school. She was also taking some more time to find her spirit animal.

Inside the waiting room, another assistant was helping out a younger student fill out the form for his first time doing this.

Bitterly, Joey thought about how the other students were going to find their spirit animals long before he did. He wasn't sure what exactly made his so different, he did know it was though. He heard a lot about how normal spirit animal connections worked from other students, particularly from Henry.

But it wasn't like he could speed this along or anything. He was so lost in his thoughts he almost missed Henry speaking to him until he noticed Henry getting up and leaving.

"Let's go to class," Henry called softly, getting him to follow him down the hall to their next class.

.~.~.~.

The next session Joey had, he decided to go alone and let Henry study for the upcoming test. He sat down in the waiting room and pulled out a text book so he could study as well. Nearby, he could see the boy from last time talking with a couple other boys from the grade below, one of the two filling out the session appointment form, no doubt that was what they were there for.

One of the other two finished the form and handed it to an assistant who walked up to talk to them. "Thank you, Mr. Polk," the young man said before turning to the other boy who Joey hadn't seen before. "Mr. Franks, ready for your first session?"

The boy stood up excitedly. "Yeah!" he cried. He followed the assistant out of the room just as a woman assistant walked in. "Sammy," she called, looking over at the boy from last time.

The boy, a brunet-blond younger student, closed his own study book and started to follow the woman out of the room, tossing his backpack over his shoulder. Joey guessed that he must not have learned his spirit animal last time. That was fairly normal, it usually took around two-three sessions anyway. Joey was one of the few people on his fourth session.

Another assistant walked into the waiting room and called for him, Joey shoving his text-book back into his bookbag and following the assistant out of the room and into one of the confrontation rooms. Inside the room was a very pleasant smell, meant to help the students relax to make the process easier. Decorative and very soft pillows laid in various places, including cushions meant for meditation for the students who cold sit on the floor. With his weak leg, Joey could not sit on the floor so he used a chair instead.

The assistant sat down on one of the cushions and started to meditate with his clipboard in his lap. "You know the drill," he began. "Just relax, let your spirit animal present themselves to you."

They hadn't yet, he didn't see why they would now at the fourth time, but he tried anyway. Joey relaxed and allowed his mind to wander to whatever world the spirit preferred to inhabit. Most people said they found theirs in beautiful places that matched the animals climate, but all he normally saw was darkness.

It started out as dark as usual but them something began to change. Light began to enter in places, bringing him to a rickety, abandoned building. The light source, he discovered, was the boarded up windows, showing the dying outside world through the bits of glass not covered by planks of wood or three inches of dust. The room inside the building still remained dimly lit at best, shadows covering as much as they possibly could. In the midst of a shadow, two eyes watched him.

"I see something," he said softly, focusing as best he could. "It looks like an old building, the windows are boarded up."

"Do you have an idea of where it is?" the assistant asked, writing down the information he was giving him.

"I can see trees outside. I think they're dead," Joey explained. "There's shadows everywhere, I think I can see something in one of the shadows. I see... two eyes... watching me. It's taller than me."

The assistant made a sound of concern as he wrote down more of what Joey was telling him. "Can you make out any more of the animal?"

"I'll try," Joey answered. He focused even more on trying to see the creature, staring into the darkness as best he could. Suddenly, he saw a Cheshire grin spread in the shadow, something lunging out to meet him. He let out a cry and backed away, throwing himself back into reality.

Just before his vision faded back to the real world, a voice filled his ears. "Hello, Joseph," the creature spoke, a whistle to its voice.

"Are you okay?!" the assistant asked, looking up at him in concern.

"I-I'm fine," Joey answered nervously. "It... it jumped at me... I couldn't see anything more than its smile... it had the creepiest smile..."

"Could be a playful spirit just having fun with you," the assistant explained, writing down everything. "And the dead trees could mean its climate is a colder one, or it has normal seasons, we're closing in on winter." Somehow, the man seemed unsure about all this but he seemed like he was trying to keep a positive attitude nonetheless. "I think we made great progress today, how about setting up another session next week?"

"Okay," Joey agreed, standing up and leaving the room. Once out, he stopped. the doors to the other rooms were open as well, assistants standing in the doorway of each one with the student they entered with. He followed their staring eyes over to another assistant who was discussing things with some men in professional looking outfits.

"What's going on?" he heard one of the students ask quietly.

"It's fine," the assistant talking to the men answered the teen. All the other students seemed scared and the teachers seemed concerned as well. It took a minute for Joey to realize what it was the men were here for, but when he did, he was concerned too.


	3. Session of Screams

"Listen here, you're scaring the children!" the assistant working with the men yelled.

"Now, listen, if we don't find those three soon, they'll mature into adults and start causing trouble, we've seen this before," one of the men explained. "We're just gonna talk to some of the kids, that's all. Now, the list?"

The assistant let out a growl but passed over a clipboard presumably containing the list the man asked for. "If you mess with any of our students, I will personally see to it that it's the last thing you do," he growled. Everyone had a spirit animal that matched their personality somehow, and this one was well known for being more of a guard dog who's very protective of the students.

The man flipped through the clipboard for a second circling specific names and underlining other things. He handed the clipboard off to someone else and looked around. "Just imagine us as more of the assistants who are here to help you find your spirit animal," he called to the students. "I'm looking for a Samuel Lawrence?"

The blond-brunet boy from earlier swallowed nervously and rose his hand. The assistant who was working with him before stepped aside and allowed the man to take her place and bring him back into the room, shutting the door behind himself.

Joey backed away at the sight but his assistant just brought him back out of their room and had him sit in the chair next to the door. He watched as other students went into the rooms with the men. It seemed like it was very specific kids only, that alternatively soothed him and made him more concerned at the same time.

After a few minutes, some of the kids started to leave the rooms, more getting up and entering the rooms in their places. Over ten minutes later and most of the kids had been cycled through, it didn't take too long for the men to tell that they weren't looking for that child. All the students there except for two, Sammy and the other boy, Wally Franks.

There was a legend of three and sometimes more people with strange spirit animals, creatures that were not at all animals. Supposedly, the spirits had been around for centuries, hopping from person to person as their previous companions died off. Everyone figured the story wasn't true, just a scary story to tell around the campfire at night, but these men showing up meant there may be more to it than they thought.

One of the remaining doors opened and Wally Franks walked out, going back to the waiting room where the other boy he and Sammy were there with was still waiting for him. "Wait, 's Sammy not out yet?" he asked upon meeting up with the boy who was sitting alone.

"Nah, there's something strange about these 'ere men," the other commented. "I don't trust 'em."

Just then a scream let out from the last occupied room, all the students looking up and all the assistants running to it at the cry. The door open and the man walked out, Sammy unconscious in his arms.

"The strain was too much and he fainted," the man explained, setting him down in a chair and grabbing for the clipboard with the list again. "Something's not quite right about his spirit animal," he explained, writing something down. "We'll need to talk with him again."

"He's just a normal wolf, that's all!" the woman who was working with him before said. "Not the hellhound that passes as a wolf you life to scare children with! Normal. Wolf."

"Than why does he act more like a bird or something?" the man asked, giving her a look. "It doesn't match up, I just wanna look a little more into it. I'm sure it's fine but my job is to look into these things."

"Well my job is to take care of these kids!" the woman replied angrily. "And what you've done is jeopardize a child!"

Another woman assistant pulled out her work phone and called the infirmary. "A student is unconscious," she said into the phone. "Yep. It's them again," she added with a bitter tone. She finished her call and hung up the phone, turning to glare at the man. "You are going to help him to the infirmary, right?" That was not a question, nor was it a request. None of the assistants took it well when something happened to a student.

"Of course," the man answered, finishing up with the clipboard and handing it off to someone else on his team. He knelt down and picked up the student again, the assistant who was assigned to work with Sammy leading him down the hall and the two other boys who came with him followed her as well, one taking his backpack.

After that, the men cleared out. Joey was just glad he didn't get called into a room with one of them really. Instead, he just had to sit outside and wait until they were done, no student was allowed to leave until they were done checking things out. Now that they were leaving, all the students were practically running to get back to their classes, a comfortable feeling now residing in getting as far away from here as possible.

.~.~.~.

His world was dark and sinister. The scenery kept changing every few steps he took, going from a creepy forest to a strange abandoned building with boarded up windows that he could see the forest he was just in a second ago. Most of the building was cast in shadow but there was a figure way taller than him that stood in one shadow.

He suddenly realized what the figure was. He could see the silhouette of its long ears, light reflecting off the shiny surface in the darkness. It's hungry eyes watched him as he tried to back away.

"Sammy," it called. Was the voice its? He couldn't tell. It started to step towards him and he backed away again. The creature stepped out of the shadow and he just barely got a look before light started to flood his vision. "It's time to wake up now."

He opened his eyes to find himself in the infirmary, a nurse nearby working on something. He started to sit up and she turned her attention towards him. "Just relax," she instructed. "You passed out in a confrontation room during the session. Just stay here and relax until you're sure you're feeling up to leaving."

He nodded and leaned against the headboard of the bed, reaching for his bookbag and pulled out a text book, might as well do a bit more studying while he was in school.

"Oh, by the way," the nurse began, handing him a slip of paper. "I was told to give this to you, it's your next session."

After how the last one went, he wasn't sure he wanted to do another. The first one went fine. They determined his spirit animal was a wolf of some sort but he didn't get a clear image so they decided to do another one to try to connect better. He had awoken in his spirit's world, which was a peaceful field somewhere. Bright blue sky, beautiful trees, flowers, the sound of birds singing. He could see a small wolf sitting amongst the trees in a nearby forest. It was okay, the session itself, but then that man showed up and the first thing he saw was flames taking over the field, the trees and grass dying in an instant as the fire washed over them.

He remembered panicking at the sudden change and then the cute, small wolf he saw in the trees grew to a giant, furious thing that he couldn't really see well. It opened its mouth to bare it huge fangs and revealed a small, single bird trapped in it's mouth like a cage. The bird was unharmed but mimicking Sammy's fear at the situation. Then the creature shut its mouth and a wave of pain struck through Sammy's entire body, that was when he had screamed, past then was so fuzzy it was just about nonexistent. That must have been when he passed out.

He stared at the slip of paper the nurse handed him, telling him the time his next session was scheduled for. The urge to throw it away and run home, to switch schools, just the feeling of the need to escape, it was overwhelming. He didn't even realize the panic attack or what he was doing until he felt a hand on his shoulder, jumping at the feeling.

"Shh, shh, shh," the nurse whispered. "It's okay. I saw you shaking, are you alright?"

"I-I'm fine," he lied. He was sure it was plain that he wasn't, but the nurse accepted his words and returned to her work. He soon found himself looking back down at his own.


	4. One of Three?

Joey was thankful to the assistant and his attempts to rationalize what his spirit animal could be. The assistant had written 'possibly fall climate' and 'playful' for notes and by the end of the notes, it sounded more like a cat. But he knew it wasn't a cat, it was some other creature that he had never see before. Still, the men from that group didn't know about it, so he didn't have to work with them.

He saw them question that Susie girl a few days after they first showed up, only to determine that she was a swan and leave her alone. He even saw them talk to Henry for a couple minutes but were quick to determine he was fine and moved on. The person he felt really bad for was Sammy though, the younger student kept getting cornered by the men and interviewed. At least it wasn't as bad as the first time they spoke to him, the time he fainted.

Barely a week later, he had learned from Henry, who spoke with Norman, Susie, and Wally, that Sammy had switched schools to get away from the men. Apparently, his parents had even come into the school and complained about harassment to the principle while taking their son from school. Not long later, Wally had done the same.

A week after those two left, the men had left as well. It seemed that their primary suspects for the legend were those two and they weren't about to bother anyone else. really, Joey doubted the legend was even real, let alone that those two were involved. One was a goofy kid into electronics, constantly trying to study the technology the school had with Thomas. The other was completely into music, it was his passion in life, whoever thought he was a 'Hellhound' was out of their minds.

The fact that the men were there at all made Joey start questioning things more, specifically about the legend. He decided to do some more research on it and went to the library after school with Henry, who was also curious. Working together, the two soon learned a few things.

The men who came to their school were part of a group who's entire job was to seek out the people with the spirits and bring them in. They had two out of three of the people before but then the two they had committed suicide, one 17 years ago and the other 16. The legend said that there were usually three people with spirits of creatures from Hell, not from earth like normal spirit animals. The spirits included a demon, a fallen angel, and a hellhound, sometimes the hellhound brought more with it.

Of course, as he already knew of the legend, the spirit's "companions", or hosts as they actually were, basically reincarnated. As one died, a new one would be born in their place. So when the two died 17 and 16 years ago, that explained why the men were looking in highschools for students of specific ages.

Some of what he read about them included a warning to all who may run into them at some point. The three, or more, were highly dangerous and needed to be captured and locked away or else they would start to cause trouble. The last fallen angel, Alice, was found as a teenager attacking people who insulted her. The last hellhound, Boris, was found after literally destroying parts of a town. And the last demon, Bendy, was never caught, but was sighted once leaving the scene of a major crime, the police were still on the fence of whether or not he did it.

The articles also warned that they were unstable, switching back and forth between their real personalities, fake personalities, and those of the spirits. They would do this when they first learn who their spirit is and then they'd stop once they eventually fused with their spirit, something Alice had done but the team were able to keep Boris from doing. Once they fused, they were virtually unstoppable without the right equipment. And if all thee of them fused and met each other... well... it wouldn't say more than the world would be in grave danger.

One of the articles contained pictures drawn of the vague idea of what the spirits looked like based off their previous hosts' descriptions, as well as doodles from the hosts who could draw. Joey had to stop and stare at one of the creatures, the one known as Bendy. Those eyes... that smile... he'd seen them before.

.~.~.~.

During his next session, Joey made another breakthrough on his own spirit animal. Specifically that he was right, this was no animal. Of course, after learning that, he couldn't tell the assistant of what it was. This time, when the abandoned building began to form around him, the creature was already out in the open, watching him.

"So you figured it out, eh?" Bendy asked with a cackle. "I knew those idiots would spark your curiosity and help in the end!"

"It's really you," Joey thought, keeping his mouth shut in reality to hide what was going on.

"Yep, it's me! In the flesh, so to speak!" Bendy answered, bowing dramatically. He stood back up to his full height and grinned. "And you and I are gonna have a blast, you know that?"

Joey smiled as well. "I'm aware," he replied. "So we have to find the others then?"

"Straight to the plan, nice!" Bendy said. "It'll take a while, there's no rush, they haven't discovered yet. An' if they're anything like the last hosts, they won't for a while longer."

Joey nodded. "So what do I tell the assistant? Obviously, I can't tell him that my spirit animal is the demon those guys were looking for," he asked.

"The demon? Those guys don't even know where to begin to look for me, I could be five for all they know!" Bendy laughed. "Nah, they were here lookin' for Boris, hence why they spent so long with that poor kid. But you're right, they can't know where I am. Didn't the assistant think ya matched up more with a cat?"

"That's what it looks like anyway," Joey answered.

Bendy crouched down to the size of a small animal and smiled, bringing a balled hand up like a paw. "Meow."

Joey stared at him in shock before smiling as well.

.~.~.~.

Years passed. Joey and Henry graduated and went to collage to start a cartoon studio. It took a lot of work for them, both having to take up other jobs first to be able to afford it, but once they could, they got started.

During the time in between highschool and starting the studio, Joey and Bendy formed a bond and worked on planning out how to find the other two spirits and what to do after finding them. To their surprise, after starting the studio, it appeared that the other two came to them instead of them having to go looking.

It happened not long after the studio first started. Joey had put out an ad for job openings for music and voice acting, as well as other jobs, and got responses from two people he never thought he'd see again, Susie Campbell and Sammy Lawrence.

Out of the two of them, Susie had stayed in their highschool, but he really never thought Sammy would return to their town at all after what happened. With the two of them working there, Wally Franks and Norman Polk joined as well. Apparently, Susie and Sammy got along because of taste in music and stayed in touch so it was Susie who got him back in town, and Wally had switched to Sammy's new school when he left and the two of them kept in contact with Norman.

Then Norman brought up and eventually called in another high school friend who used to also hang out with Wally. Thomas Connor. More and more people started to show up to work in the studio, most of them just looking for a job of any sort, not even thinking how odd it was that Joey started a cartoon based off the three Legendary Spirits. They soon had another voice actress, Alison Pendle, a merchandise designer, Shawn Flynn, and thankfully an accountant, Grant Cohan, who was someone they needed the most since Joey couldn't keep track of money for the life of him.

Overall, none of them seemed to think the studio or cartoon were that odd, at least no one was going to question Joey's decisions. Joey and Henry had agreed before hand that a goofy cartoon with the Legendary Spirits could be a fun and entertaining show. The only person who did question him was Sammy, which was fair he supposed, it actually gave him the chance to talk to him about it anyway. He was convinced that Sammy was actually at least _**a**_ Boris but it wasn't like it was something he could easily bring up, this presented him the perfect opportunity for it.

"I understand why you'd be uncomfortable with this, Sammy," Joey began, watching the other squirm slightly across the desk. "I mean, I saw the way those men wouldn't leave you alone about it and I kept thinking that they'd have to be crazy to think you're one of the Legendary Spirits, it just doesn't match your personality. By the way, did you ever meet your spirit animal?"

"I quit attending sessions at all after that, so not exactly," Sammy answered. "I know it's a wolf of some sort, but... the reason why I was supposed to take more sessions was the place I saw the wolf at, it wasn't a normal place to see a wolf. It was a field out in the middle of nowhere near a nice forest, the wolf was in the forest, but it wasn't normal wolf habitat at all." It was plain he wasn't saying everything, there was something else... something that made him even more uncomfortable.

Joey just smiled and leaned on his hands calmly. Incorrect habitat? Perfect. Never saw the wolf clearly? Even better. The cherry on top was how obvious it was that he was hiding something as well. "I always figured you were the type for a peaceful field," he stated. "Maybe with birds singing, clear skies, a truly lovely place to be I'm sure."

"Yeah, I guess it was nice before... before the men," Sammy replied awkwardly. He looked up at Joey again. "How about you, Mr. Drew?"

Joey tensed up but managed to hide it as well as he could. Every part of him was screaming 'abort mission', and he wanted to do just that as he forced the smile to remain on his face. "I learned eventually," he explained. "It took about five sessions, but it eventually approached me. Playful little thing wanted to keep playing hide-and-seek," he laughed, watching his employee to see how he'd respond. Sammy was on to him, that was for sure.

Somehow, he managed to leave it at that and end their little meeting there, reassuring Sammy that there was nothing wrong with the cartoon and he was just paranoid. It was only after he got him out of his office that the smile fell from his face. He shut the door and locked it. "Well, Bendy," he began softly. "Was it him?"

"Hard to say," Bendy answered, receiving a noise of disappointment from Joey. "What? It's not like I'm a mind reader or anything! I can't get inside people's minds... not unless they're one of the spirits I'm lookin' for and they know it, that is. Even if he is one, he doesn't know."

"I guess I'll just have to help him find out," Joey hissed through gritted teeth.


	5. Steps Taken and Untaken

It was his mistake, leaving his plans out on his desk like that. Was he going to blame himself for it? No, of course not. He'd done nothing wrong. If Henry had listened to him and not entered unannounced, they wouldn't be in this mess. If anything, it was Henry's fault.

"You're not really a cat, are you?" Henry asked, watching him nervously before shifting his eyes down to the desk. Designs for a machine of sorts lay in it's blueprint form, displaying to the world what it was and what it's true intention was. Ink was hard to get, Joey thought he was being sneaky with the ink machine design, of course Henry would be too smart for that lie. The blueprints were for a machine that would amplify the strength of a spirit animal, allowing for Joey to find the legendary ones with ease.

"No wonder you're so obsessed with the Legendary Spirits," Henry continued, gaze turning to glare and he took an angry stance. His hand slammed into the desk. "How much more have you been lying about, Joey? Is your name even Joey? Were we ever even friends?!"

"Now you're just being silly," Joey laughed. "I should have known you'd be too smart, you always were. It's true, I have been lying. But it will be so worth it in the end~."

Henry grabbed for all the documents and papers on Joey's desk, going through as many as he could. He glared at him again and threw the papers back to the desk. "You've got to be f***ing kidding me!" he growled, banging his hands on the desk again. "Joey, this is insane! You can't force them to fuse with their spirit... creatures like that!"

"Why not?" Joey asked, his signature smile spreading across his face. "I'm just helping them along. After all, they don't know yet, I'm just going to provide a little push in the right direction for them."

"They're already here, aren't they?" Henry realized, his eyes widening as he uttered the question. He gripped some papers again and flipped through them, finding a notepaper with names and notes on things. The paper crumpled in his fist and was thrown across the room in a fit of a pure rage never seen before in the usually calm man. "Leave those two alone," he growled. "They've done nothing to deserve this."

"They're just my primary suspects," Joey explained. "But, I would bet good money on the two of them, especially Susie. At this point, I'm surprised she hasn't learned herself yet, but really she must be Alice. In the case of Sammy, there's still a slim chance he actually is a wolf, one I doubt highly. In fact, I would argue he's not much of a canine at all."

"I don't care what either of them are, just leave them out of this crazy scheme of yours!" Henry cried.

"I'd love to but you see, the problem here is that they're already part of it," Joey replied. "In fact, everyone here has been part of it since the moments they walked through that door for the first time."

"Well, you can count me out of this, because I quit!"

It took a second for that to sink in, but soon Joey found himself standing up, even with his leg screaming at him not to. "You can't quit!" he cried.

"Why not?" Henry asked, crossing his arms. "What? Are you forcing people to stay here now? Do you lock everyone in here at night so they can't see their families or something? Joey, I'm quitting and you can't stop me." With that, he turned and left the office, slamming the door shut behind himself on the way out.

Joey just couldn't believe what had just occurred. Henry had betrayed them all, or at least that's how he saw it. He sat back down in his chair, fuming in anger as he tried to think through what happened and if he needed to do anything to counteract it. A knock at the door stirred him and he looked up to see Sammy peering through the doorway at him, a feeling of calm washing over a bit. "What are you doing here, Sammy?" he called with a smile. He still had the two Legendary, he didn't need Henry.

"I... well... everyone just saw Henry storm out of the building," Sammy explained, looking a bit stressed. "We're a bit concerned abou-"

"Oh, it's nothing to worry about at all," Joey assured him, bringing his signature smile back to his face. "Henry and I just had a bit of a disagreement but I assure you, everything is going to be fine! He'll be back once he realizes just how perfect this plan is," he added. A bit passive aggressive of him, he would admit, but he didn't care. He was still angry and needed to do anything in his power to keep the two others under his control.

.~.~.~.

Well, that didn't last long actually. Within a few days, tall, strong men in professional clothing, as well as others who wore more of army-type clothing, arrived at the door. Upon someone opening it and nervously greeting them, they whipped out their badges to reveal that they were from the group Joey saw in highschool. The leader of the group told everyone when they walked into the main area that they had gotten a call about the Legendary Spirits being in the studio and they needed to investigate.

To add insult in injury, Henry had accompanied them to point out exactly who they were looking for. And unfortunately, Susie and Sammy were already in the main area, working with some other employees on something Joey assigned them to a while ago. Henry just pointed to the two of them and told the leader of the group that they were the ones they were looking for.

The group approached the two, the leader trying to keep them calm as best he could. The plan didn't work well as the second he and the others got close to them, Susie started screaming and fighting the nearest ones with a cry of "I'm Alice Angel", which only helped them by clarifying that she was, in fact, one of the people they were looking for.

At the sight of her outburst, the leader immediately went for Sammy, at first shielding him from a chair that had been thrown in his general direction, the chair being meant to hit the leader but Susie had missed in rage. Then he took him by the arm and started to pull him away from the others, trying to keep him calm the entire time by distracting him with his voice.

It took most of the others in the group to restrain Susie, but eventually the job was done, the group had managed to catch two of the Legendary Spirits and were already leaving the building.

Joey walked up to Henry and pulled him aside. "What are you doing?!" he hissed.

"Protecting them from you," Henry answered through his teeth, anger still present in his eyes.

"You don't know what you've just condemned them to!" Joey persisted.

"I know exactly what I've done," Henry replied. "They'll be perfectly fine and safe. I checked with those guys ahead of time and they specialize with taking care of the spirits if they find them and keeping them calm. If the person doesn't know or hasn't shown much of being a host yet, it's basically a life in a nice apartment. They'll be fine." He smiled. "And the best part is, they're far away from you."

Joey let out a low growl as he turned away. Now he needed to build the machine and break into a governmental building and steal -rescue- the two taken from him. He refused to believe that the people who took them were really going to treat them kindly. Even if it was a nice place and the people were fairly nice, it was still a prison, a cage to keep them locked away forever.

"A minor setback," Bendy commented. "But it means we'll know where to find them when we're ready."

That soothed Joey's anger. He turned away from Henry and returned to his office, shouting orders at the employees. "Get back to work!" he called. "This changes nothing! Alison, take over for Susie! We'll find music later!" He turned back to Henry. "And you! Get out of my business!"

"With pleasure!" Henry replied, turning and leaving again.

Joey slammed his office door and collapsed in his chair. Now he needed to do more research to learn even more about the organization who stole the two from him.

.~.~.~.

A week passed since the organization showed up and the need for replacements for the two was starting to show. Alison's voice wasn't exactly like Susie's, especially their Alice Angel voice, Joey supposed it was hard to replace the real thing so it was understandable, and it was hard to find a music director who could work close enough to the music Sammy used to create.

He wasn't exactly in a hurry to replace them anyway, he wanted to get them back as soon as he could. He had done much research, learning that Henry was right, they had changed the way the kept the hosts so it would be more comfortable and they were less likely to kill themselves, as they had before. He still viewed it as nothing more than a cage meant to keep them trapped.

Already there had been news articles about the capture of the other two, even pictures of them made top headlines. Other articles talked about parents and past friends being shocked to learn the truth about the two, people saying they were 'such quiet children' and such.

Joey finished drawing the last line on the design for the machine and reached for his phone to make the call. His fingers dialed a number he knew well by now, Murry Hill. It was time to make the machine and brings his plans from paper to reality.


	6. According to Research and Memories

It had been two weeks since the organization showed up and took them, right in the middle of their jobs, too. The were brought to a fairly nice looking building, would have been nicer if not for the barbed wire lined, tall, brick fence lining the entire place. Other than that, it was like a mansion.

When they were being brought here, the two of them sat in the back of an army-like van, heavily guarded by men armed with stun weapons. The men weren't allowed to actually harm them in any way, otherwise it could end up violent and lethal, and the two of them were not allowed to die, no matter what.

Then they had been ushered inside and the front door was locked and guarded. A few people came out of the next room with paper and measuring tapes and began to measure them thoroughly, sizing them for more clothing. The people later returned with extensive wardrobes of beautiful clothes for the two of them. The outfits were almost as luxurious as the house itself.

The only issue was, they were still prisoners. Neither of them were allowed to leave the building unless they were guarded. And it really was a nice place, they both had bedrooms bigger than their apartments, there was a library, a sitting room, even a grande piano, everything they could have ever dreamed up. Everything except for freedom.

There was a garden out back they were allowed into with a fountain in the center and flowers blooming everywhere they looked, including the trees which were covered in flowering vines. They could go out there any time they wanted, and after only a couple days they started to just so they could feel a little bit of freedom from the house.

Susie left the building the most, spending most of her time out by the fountain with a book from the library. There were times when Sammy would join her, but not quite as often since he usually preferred to stay indoors rather than out. She didn't see him as much anymore, didn't talk to him much either, she wasn't sure what he did at all anymore.

It was about halfway through their second week that she learned what he had been occupying his time with. She was sitting on the edge of the fountain with a book when he came out to talk to her, holding up a notepad and a book from the library.

"I think I found something," he said, walking up to her and sitting on the edge as well. "I was trying to figure out how Henry seemed to figure out that we were the Legendary Spirits, which I still partially doubt, and I found this," he opened the book and flipped through it until he got to the correct page, setting it between them. "It says here that it's common for the three to be in the vague area of each other," he explained.

"So? That just means we have a Bendy somewhere," Susie stated.

"Yes, at the studio," Sammy continued. "The way I see it, Henry must have heard the idea that we're hosts from somewhere, and my guess is that he ran into the host of Bendy. The Bendy host was probably watching us, so that's why Henry reported us."

"But that just brings up more questions," Susie sighed. "Like why we're here and not the Bendy host and why did Henry report us to be locked away like that?"

"Especially since there was no confirmation that we were hosts," Sammy agreed, sighing as well. He stared up towards the trees, watching a few birds hop around.

"They may be onto something with you being a canine of some sort," Susie laughed. "You're one of the most easily distracted people I've ever seen."

"I am not easily distracted," Sammy argued, still watching the trees calmly, a look of longing in his eyes. "I merely appreciate the music that nature offers. Now, what were we talking about?"

"See what I mean?" Susie said as she continued to laugh. "We were talking about how we ended up here and how you think the Bendy host was at the studio. I can't believe they knew I was Alice, I didn't even really know. Well, I guess it didn't really register in my mind anyway, that is until... you know."

Sammy nodded slightly, still watching the birds just a bit.

"So... are you Boris?" Susie asked. It was the question that was always on her mind now since she knew how much Sammy denied it before. She tensed up a bit as she watched his face for any sign of reaction, it seemed so serene just watching the birds flutter about. Deny all he wanted, he could never convince her that he wasn't easy to distract... a very canine trait...

"As far as I'm aware of, no," Sammy answered, turning back to her. He still had a fairly calm look on his face, not typical of the Hellhound Boris. "Then again, how would I know exactly? I stopped attending sessions to learn fully about my spirit animal and I don't care to learn now, especially with the new bits of information I've found and, well, this place."

Susie nodded in understanding before staring up towards the sky. "I remember when I met Alice," she said with a contented sigh. "At first, we thought I was a swan because all I saw was the most beautiful white feathers, fluttering the air like when birds sometimes loose their feathers. But then, the place I was in was suddenly quite dark and someone was watching me from a shadow."

Sammy froze up as she talked, staring down at the ground as sweat started to trickle down his brow. Susie didn't notice as she continued to talk though.

"Then, after the men left, she stepped out to talk to me," she continued, a smile gracing her lips. "She was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen in my life. As soon as I saw her, light filled the room and the feathers began to fall again, covering the floor in a soft pile of pure white. She spoke briefly, telling me that I couldn't tell anyone, then the session ended. It was the most amazing experience. How about you, Sammy?"

She turned to look at him, only to see his arms trembling, his breathing unsteadily shaking. Worry filled her as she started to register what was going on. "Sammy?!"

.~.~.~.

Her voice was like a faint whisper in the wind that was attacking his consciousness, a noise he heard but didn't register as words. His face was staring at the ground but his eyes saw nothing, only a memory of the field as it burned and the horrifying monster that watched him like he was its prey. And that poor bird trapped inside its mouth, his whole body reeled every time image of it entered his mind.

"Sammy?" There it was again, the creature's terrifying voice, calling to him from the darkness, trying to get him to walk closer. Why? So it could devour him, too?

"Sammy!" the voice called yet again. He felt hands grab his shoulders, throwing him out of his vision with a scream. The next thing he knew, he had plunged backwards into the fountain, its cold water fully awakening him. He sat up quickly and coughed out the water that made it into his mouth, looking up to see Susie staring at him in worry.

"Are you okay?" she asked, holding out a hand to pull him out, one he accepted. "Sorry I scared you like that. You completely blanked out and didn't hear anything I said, I panicked... sorry..."

Sammy was about to reply when he was interrupted by the sound of footsteps rushing towards them. A guard and two members of the staff raced up, one carrying a towel that they immediately wrapped around Sammy's shoulders. The member of the staff began to lead him away, not allowing him any time to talk to Susie, even though he tried to. He turned to watch her as he was lead back inside, giving her an apologetic smile.

The staff member immediately set to drying him off and giving him dry clothing to change into, as well as some tea. The entire time, the older gentlemen warned him that if he wasn't more careful, he was going to catch a cold. Before long, he was sitting by the fireplace in the sitting room, tea in hands and blanket around shoulders. He peered up at the sound of someone approaching, eyes watching the entrance.

Susie walked up to him and sat down in the chair next to his, setting a small pile of books her lap. "Hey," she greeted softly. "I'm really sorry about startling you earlier..." she said, voice nervous and awkward.

"It's okay, it wasn't really your fault," Sammy said, turning with a smile to try to sooth her. "I -um- never told anyone about it before, but... well... the way you described meeting Alice reminded me of the session I had when they first showed up."

Susie stared at him in pure shock. "W- you mean... you actually are Boris?"

"I never said that!" Sammy replied. He sighed. "Before the men showed up, I wasn't lying or anything when I said it was a field near a forest. But then the men showed up and everything was on fire, this giant creature walked out of the woods with a bird in its mouth. I didn't get a good look at it before I passed out, I still see it every time I think back to that day."

Susie was quiet the entire time. "That might not mean you're Boris, just close to whoever Boris's host is," she explained. "Or to any of the other hosts... like me." She looked down at her hands as an awkward smile. "Although, it's probably not because of me, if it was, the creature would have a human heart inside it's mouth," she said with a slight laugh.

Sammy gave her a vague look of concern. "I doubt it was because of you and Alice, I don't think you even knew it was Alice at the time, we were all convinced you were a swan. That just leaves the question of who are the Boris and Bendy hosts."

"Well, according to your research," Susie began, digging through the stack of books and handing one to him along with his notepad. "There can be multiple Boris hosts, Boris tends to 'spawn', or create multiples of himself hosted by different people. Whenever he does that, one is full strength and the rest aren't. Maybe someone you knew was a Boris?"

"Maybe..." Sammy agreed. He still couldn't get the image of the giant creature out of his head, but he wasn't going to let that bother him for a while. Still, there was something that felt wrong about the whole thing.


	7. Nightmare

The flames roared, rising up and brutally killing everything in their path. The grass was already completely brown and slowly crumpling to dust. What once looked like a pleasant summer day was now something straight out of a horror movie. The trees bent out of shape, curling into each other and burning like torches in the dark, ash filled sky. The only sounds filling the air were those of the flames and dying life and his own heartbeat.

A tree fell behind him, prompting him forward into the burning forest. He heard the creature start chasing him and he ran faster, trying to get as far away as he could from it. His eyes began to water in pain from all the ash flying into them, he wanted nothing more than to close them but he refused to since it would make him slow down and maybe even get hurt, and he didn't want to die. At times he could tell it was closer to him, he could even swear he felt its paw graze his back, but he still didn't slow down.

Finally, an old, run-down building came into view and he ran inside without a second thought. He slammed the door behind him and leaned against it. He felt something, most likely the creature, slam into it, nearly knocking him off his feet. But the door held tight. The place seemed safe.

He stepped away from the door nervously, advancing slowly into the building. The place was dark, yet still illuminated by the fire burning outside, it's light casting it way through the boarded up windows into the place. He could still see the world burning, and didn't feel completely safe with the place being made of old, potentially rotting, wood. But the creature was on the outside and he was on the inside, that was safe enough for the time being.

A laugh rang through the air, prompting him to look towards a corner of the room. A feminine figure stood there, the skeleton of wings cast in shadows on the walls behind her as feathers floated to the ground beneath her feet. But the feathers weren't the only thing slowly flooding the floor, a dark liquid started to drip from the walls as more poured from her hand like a waterfall. It soon reached his feet and he tried to move away from it. It was thicker than water...

A new source for it appeared exactly across from him in the darkest shadow in the room, prompting him to bring his attention upwards. The hungry eyes of the beast chasing him stared down at him as a low growl erupted from the darkness.

The liquid was now up to his knees. He looked down to try to figure out what it was. His hand dipped into it and lifted a small amount to the light to see it better, a little bit running off the sides of his hand in small trickles. Blood. The liquid was blood. He dropped the rest of the liquid as fast as he could and started to back away from the two figures.

A new sound entered the building. A singing, whistling voice called to him. He turned to face the door again, only to see it swing open and a third figure start walking from the flames towards him, like it was walking straight out of Hell. "Sammy~," it called to him. "Where areee youuuu~?" He backed away from it in fear, backing further into the blood as it continued to rise. "I'm coming to fiiiinnnnndddd yoooouuuuuu~!"

It hit him suddenly that the creature couldn't really see him. That meant he was safe... from it anyway, not from the other two in the building with him. He took a step back only for the third figure to turn its head directly towards him.

"There you are!" the creature cried, lunging towards him.

He let out a cry of fear only for it to transform into one of shock and pain as something huge hit him to the side. A hand? A paw? He couldn't tell what, it happened too fast for him to think through what just happened. The next thing he knew, he was sitting up again in the blood, which was still steadily rising despite the door's being open. He turned to see what hit him but could only see a giant shadow. Whatever it was, it was blocking the windows so he couldn't see it clearly.

"Mine!" the shadow growled angrily at the figure. It was the creature from earlier, he could tell that much about it. He could see it's hair raised up in the little bit of light, as well as it's powerful teeth as the light shown through them. There was something moving inside its mouth... the bird from before? The bird was still alive?! He thought for sure the beast killed it already.

The figure from outside stopped and stood in the doorway, paying full attention to the beast. "I've been watching, so to speak, this boy for years," it argued. "And you've been slacking off. If you really want to claim him as yours, why haven't you done so yet?"

The female figure stepped over to him and leaned down, helping pull him to his feet as she stood up. He could see her face now... it looked a lot like Susie's. Her left eye was missing, dark blood dripping out of the empty socket, and a tear in her skin stretched from her mouth up the side of her face towards her ear. She held his arm to keep him close to herself and out of the way of the other two.

"He belongs to me, get back to your own person!" the beast cried. "He is unwilling, it's a slower process!"

A low growl came from the direction of the other figure. "Just take him already! I don't care if he's willing or not, this is taking forever!"

He backed away from them again, wanting to run as far away from the figures as he possibly could. But the woman's hands held tight, not allowing him to flee no matter what.

"You've already been working on it, haven't you?" the woman asked, looking at the beast. "I think he's already claimed him."

There was something about the words claim and take that worried him, made him even more scared than he already was. It got even worse when the woman grabbed both his arms so he couldn't even fight back and the beast turned its full attention towards him.

"Maybe I will just take him," the beast uttered, backing up and leaping forward to attack him.

.~.~.~.

Sammy jolted away with a scream. It took a few minutes for him to realize where he was and remember that he was at least somewhat safe in his room at the prison-mansion. He leaned against the headboard and pulled his legs to his chest, wrapping his arms around himself as well as he tried to calm himself down.

There was a knock at the door before it was opened and two guards entered in. Now he just felt even worse about what happened. "We heard a scream, everything alright?"

He didn't want to explain anything at all to them. Not that they just freaked out over a simple nightmare, not what the nightmare was about, not a thing. Luckily, he didn't have to. A normal staff member walked in and beckoned him towards the door, prompting him to follow him out of the room and not answer any of the guard's questions.

"Joey Drew asked if he could talk to you two," the man explained, handing him the phone receiver before leaving. "I'll go talk with Miss Campbell and let her know as well."

Sammy held the phone up to his ear and tried to sound as normal as he did three weeks ago when working at the studio. Three weeks. It was hard to really think that they had been captured and held in this building for three weeks now. "What is it?" he asked a bit tiredly. It was seven in the morning and he had just woken up from a nightmare, of course Joey would call then.

"Good morning!" Joey greeted. "Listen, I know you're probably not exactly pleased with what happened, I don't know what got into Henry, sending you two away like that, and I have great news to tell you."

"This better be good," Sammy sighed, leaning against the wall.

"Oh, trust me, it is,"Joey answered. "You see, I have a plan to get you both out of there."

Sammy froze and stared into space. "Really? You do?" he asked in shock.

"Yes, give me a few more days time and I should be able to get you both free," Joey replied. "Now, if you don't mind, I'll tell Susie the news as well, alright? Oh, and I trust you slept well last night?"

Sammy made a groaning noise in response before handing the phone off to Susie as she walked up to him. He turned and walked back to his room, not bothering to say bye or anything to Joey.

.~.~.~.

Joey placed the receiver down again and smirked to himself. His plan was going perfect. Silly Henry thought that he was protecting the two when in reality all he had done was put them somewhere so Joey could keep track of them easier. With this, he knew exactly where they were all the time, collecting them would be an easy task.

And it kept getting better. It turned out that Susie was already working with Alice and was only feeling conflicted over the fact that Sammy still didn't show signs of being the wolf. Well, he showed signs, but it was still unclear on whether or not he actually was Boris, rather that he was close to possibly whoever Boris was.

During his quick talk with Susie, Joey revealed to her that he was Bendy. He quickly told her of his plan to get her and Sammy free from their prison, intending to bring them back to the studio to set his full plan into motion. The only worry was if he really didn't have Boris. If Sammy was, in fact, not Boris, he'd just have to either get rid of him or trap him.

Luckily, he was close enough to the two he was able to fuse their worlds of dreams the night before. He had the form of Bendy, Susie had the form of Alice, and Sammy was himself, but there was another figure, a large figure claiming dominance over the human. It appeared that the figure was going to answer his questions as to Sammy's role in his plans fairly soon, it may just need a little shove to fully decide.

As for his plans, the machine was finished, fully built in the next room over thanks to a Murry Hill, a man whom he would probably never have to speak to ever again. He certainly didn't intend to speak to the man again. He just wanted something that would amplify his own and other's connections to their spirit animals. Originally, the machine was meant to find the other two, but it appeared it might not be needed for that purpose anymore.

All that was left now was to get the two back. He told Susie to give him two days before she could take action herself. Most likely, he knew he would be by their location at that time, there was little doubt of that. All he needed as a little help on her end. He was providing the get away car, she was providing her own distraction, and Sammy... had no idea of what was about to go down... perhaps that was for the best.


	8. Hellish Escape

Two days had passed since they received the call from Joey. Sammy couldn't say the days were exactly... relaxing... but they weren't exactly the worst either. Ever since the call, he could see a difference in Susie. Sure, she had tried to hide it, she was almost doing well, she was an actress, after all. Still, there were... subtle hints as to the truth.

He could tell that she and Alice were fully communicating. It was a strange thing, really, going for so long convinced that the Legendary Spirits were not real to finding our your friend is one and you're probably one as well. Before, he was unconvinced on himself, but now that the creature's silhouette was appearing so often, he was starting to question things more and more.

It was morning. Nine in the morning to be exact. Normally by this time, Susie would be up and be talking with him. He had yet to see her today. Something must be wrong. He got dressed and left his room.

The building was quiet, a bit too quiet. The staff didn't like making sound much, but the silence was eerie and deafening. His footsteps creaked as he anxiously wandered the empty hallway. Wasn't there normally someone vacuuming at this time? Where were they?

Something reflective at the very end off the hallway caught his attention, prompting him forward. As he got closer, he could make out more of it. It didn't appear to have a stable shape, rather a hap-hazard one, and it's color seemed to be a very dark red. It was at this point that he was close enough to see what it was. Blood.

His first impulse was to run, run forward for no logical reason. The closer he got, the clearer things became. He could see a hand, a human hand! Just laying in the doorway, the rest of the body obscured by the door frame. He stopped just as he got to the door, staring at the corpse that seemed to stare back at him. The dead man's chest was ripped open, ribs exposed as his blood soaked into the carpet.

It was only now that the full reality started to sink in and Sammy backed away from the corpse, hand over his mouth just as the smell of blood hit him. He wanted so much for this just to be a dream. He'd do anything just to wake up and find everything back to normal, but it didn't appear that wishes would work.

He tried to wake up, pinching his skin, reading, causing himself physical pain, everything pointed to this being real. He took a final look at the corpse before running towards the stairs to the lower level. He knew he needed to get out. He was probably the safest there as he could tell this was Susie's doing, but he didn't want to find out if she really would harm him.

Blood was soaking the stairs, dark drips forming in the carpet as it seeped through. His feet barely touched any though as he continued to run. The screaming had started, he could hear the voices of the staff and guards, some crying, some pleading for help, one screaming in a horrible pain. It was when he made it to the main level that he could see the carnage.

Bodies lay everywhere, all with their chests ripped open and organs spilling out to the floor, all missing their hearts. He took a glance towards the exit, seeing a figure running towards it as well from the window. Whoever they were, they were still far away and he couldn't tell if they were here to help him. He chose to run from them, too, running towards the screams.

He soon found Susie, dressed in a simple black dress with a cute bow on top and long black gloves and shoes to match, dripping in the blood of many people and holding a man up in the air by his throat. She let out the most maniacal laugh he had ever heard, putting all movie villains to shame, as she rammed her hand through the man's chest and ripped out his heart, throwing the body to the ground in near a pile of more corpses.

"Su-Susie?" he asked, voice shaking as he stared around at the carnage around him.

The woman turned to him and smiled brightly. "Oh, hello~!" she called with a wave. "I'll be just a second, I have a little more work to deal with~!"

Sammy just stood there and watched as she ripped the heart out of another poor person, discarding the body and holding the heart close so she could watch it slowly die in her own hands. "Susie," he called again, getting her attention. "Susie, please stop this. This isn't like you!"

"What are you talking about?" Susie asked, standing up straight after kneeling next to her last victim. "This is me, Sammy. I swear it."

"No, it's Alice," Sammy replied. "You're acting like Alice. I know you, Susie, you're a sweet woman. You'd never kill anyo-" he didn't get to finish as a hand covered his mouth and he felt himself being pulled against the chest of a bigger and stronger man. The hand released him and he turned to see Joey standing there behind him, smiling down upon him.

"Ready to go?" Joey asked casually, as if blood was not ruining his nice shoes at this very moment.

"Yeah, just a sec," Susie called to him. She brutally killed the last person and turned back to the two men with a smile. "Alright, now I'm ready~!"

Sammy pulled away from Joey. "Y-you're both crazy," he choked out. He turned and began to run again, trying to escape them both now. His legs were really starting to tire but he couldn't afford to stop.

"Oh, come on, Sammy!" he heard Joey call to him. "Don't be like this!"

He still didn't stop. He could hear the two of them chasing him, both trying desperately to catch up to him. He refused to slow, mind racing to think of an escape plan. He spent so long trying to learn about the Legendary Spirits, he never once looked for an escape, and now he was regretting it. He figured if he made it to the stairs, he could escape Joey anyway, Susie he wasn't sure about.

He started to head for the stairs when he stopped. The figure from his nightmares was there, guarding the stairs and watching his every move. He could hear the two behind him catch up. Still in fear for his life, he stood still, frozen in his spot.

Arms wrapped around him and he found himself in a warm embrace from Joey. "Caught you!" Joey laughed. His laughter died down slowly. "What's got you so spooked?" he asked, concern and worry in his voice.

"D-do you not see it?" Sammy asked, pointing at the figure in front of the stairs.

Susie caught up and looked around. "All I see is one of my earlier victims," she commented, voice sounding a little unsure. "H-hey, you're not that scared of what you saw, right?" she asked. "You know I'd never hurt you..."

"I don't think he's talking about the body," Joey cut her off. He turned Sammy away from the stairs, leading him back towards the exit. "Come on," he whispered soothingly. "I promised I'd get you two out and here I am, now let's go home."

.~.~.~.

The ride was eerie. Joey drove, Susie sat next to him in the passenger seat, and Sammy sat in the back, hands in his hair as he continued to just stare in space in shock. The three were in silence for the longest time before Joey spoke. He didn't expect Sammy to listen to him so it was mostly to Susie that he was speaking to. "I swear, I had nothing to do with this."

"With what? Him?" Susie asked, glancing behind herself to check on Sammy. She turned back to the road with a sigh. "Whatever it was, it must have been terrifying," she stated.

"I almost feel bad with what I've put him through and need to put him through soon," Joey said. "But I must be sure as to his role in my plans. Boris or an innocent person I've forced to suffer, just the first of my massacre."

"You're Bendy... aren't you?"

It was the first they had heard him speak since they left the stairwell at the building and it caused both of them to freeze. Joey pulled the car over and he and Susie looked into the back seat.

Sammy wasn't exactly back to normal but he wasn't shaking or whimpering anymore, so they supposed he was doing better. He peered up at them, hair falling over his face. "Well?" he asked nervously. "Are you Bendy?"

Joey exchanged looks with Susie before turning back to him and nodding. "I am," he answered. "And I'm so sorry."

.~.~.~.

The rest of the ride had been silent. Not long after Joey spoke to him, Sammy slipped into unconsciousness and soon began shaking and whimpering again as the nightmares returned. Upon arrival at the studio, Joey carried him inside while Susie walked beside him, looking around.

"It's a work day," Susie stated. "Where are the employees?"

"I gave them the day off," Joey answered, setting Sammy down in a chair and walking towards the room that hid his prize. Susie followed behind him. He could feel her excitement radiating off of her. "Here it is," he said as he walked into the room. He threw his arms up to emphasize his masterpiece, the Ink Machine.

"Interesting," Susie commented. "What's it for?"

"This, my dear, is the Ink Machine," Joey explained. "It amplifies our spirits to their max potential. With it, we will finally rule the world as it was always meant to be." He smiled softly at his creation, his beautiful creation. "And with it, we'll finally know who Boris is."

Susie smiled as well, more of a smirk at his words.

"Now we just have to do one final thing," Joey sighed. He really didn't want to put the poor blond in the other room through more, but he had to be sure.

* * *

{~ Sammy suffers, poor Sammy. But don't worry, Sammy, the editing isn't fun for me either. Anyway, just about halfway through, I think! ~}


	9. Imprisoned Massacre

Susie stood back and watched as Joey laid Sammy on the floor next to the machine. "I know you're awake," Joey spoke, getting Sammy to look up at him. "I won't lie, this is going to hurt. I need you to focus on your spirit animal."

"What is this?" Sammy hissed at him. "Are you a councilor now? An assistant? Just like those men pretended to be in highschool?"

"I hate to do this," Joey sighed. "Don't force me to do this."

Sammy sat up and started to shuffle away, backing away from him. "Well, I'm not doing anything you tell me to!" he growled.

Joey just sighed again. "You leave me with no choice," he uttered. Swiftly, he leaped forward and tackled the musician to the floor, hand reaching up to grab his face. He could feel Sammy trying to fight him, hear his screams even, but everything faded as they entered the other world.

The darkness of the other world soon turned into light, reintroducing them both to the abandoned building again. Like before, the angel stood off to the side and the figure of a giant creature loomed over them. In this world, Joey had taken the form of Bendy, but Sammy remained himself.

Bendy held the human close in his arms, soothing his fears and pains as best he could. The creature took a step closer.

"He remains unwilling," the creature spoke. At his words, Sammy began trying hard to escape Bendy' arms.

"There's no time to try to talk to him anymore," Bendy said. He shoved Sammy towards the creature. "He's yours, so just do it." He cackled suddenly, "I always knew it was you, Boris."

.~.~.~.

The creature walked into the light to reveal itself to be the wolf-like hellhound. Sammy stared up at it, shaking in fear slightly. he could feel tears running down his cheeks as the creature walked closer and closer. "Please stop," he whispered.

He felt a paw slam down upon him, trapping him against the floor. He shut his eyes in pain and screamed again. Then he felt something wet and opened his eyes to look around. The ground was soft, no longer hard like a floor at all, and there were long, sharp objects protruding from the floor and ceiling around it. He reached for one and froze.

Teeth. They were teeth. He was trapped inside the monster's mouth, it's prisoner as the bird had been before. Outside, the two others were watching him, Joey and Susie -no- Bendy and Alice stood there.

"You were unwilling," Bendy said with a shrug. "Sorry but we're outta time to show you the light in order for you to agree with us, we had no choice."

Sammy stared around in terror. This wasn't how he wanted to die. He didn't want to die, certainly not by being eaten by a Hellhound-wolf. He soon realized how lucky he was. He took a closer look at the teeth, probably to see how soon his death was to be, but realized that the creature was keeping its mouth partially open with no intent on closing it all the way.

Bendy and Alice faded away, leaving Sammy and the Hellhound alone. "Don't worry," Boris whispered to him. "I'm not going to hurt you."

"Wh-what a-are you going to do then?" Sammy questioned, flinching at the creature began to speak again.

"I need you alive and okay," Boris explained. "This way... is only temporary. I'll release you into a controlled area soon enough."

Sammy was still understandably feeling a rollercoaster of emotions, all of them negative. He was angry, scared, hurt, everything. But he took solace in knowing that he was going to be relatively okay, the creature had no intent of harming him.

.~.~.~.

Elsewhere, Joey woke up and began looking around. Susie was sitting in a chair in the corner, one she probably brought in herself a few minutes ago, and Sammy was still asleep in his arms. It was obvious, and expected really, that he was in some pain when he woke up.

"Sammy?" Joey asked softly when he saw his eyes flutter open. There was no answer for a minute, only silence. "Boris?" he tried again, this time getting a reaction.

The hellhound in the human's body turned to look at him with a slight glare. "Of course I'm Boris," he growled. "Did you really expect Sammy to answer? He's my prisoner!"

"That's what it looked like, true, but I wanted to be sure," Joey replied, defending himself.

"You always want to be sure," Boris growled, continuing to glare at him as he stood up, hands dug deep into his pockets.

Joey stood up as well, an evil smile gracing his face. "You do realize what this means, don't you?" he spoke, getting the attention of the other two in the room. "Now, we rule this world!"

The other two stared at him in confusion before both smirked, mirror his facial expression back at him.

.~.~.~.

The next day was only the beginning of their massacre. The entire studio was filled with screams of terror and of pain as they began their quest to gain more strength and power. The only break from the screams was the begging and pleading for mercy, the cries of people begging to see their families again, a request none of the three were ready to fulfill.

Susie looked at the heart in her hand, a wicked smile still on her face. Nearby, Boris wiped away the blood that was dripping from his hair in front of his eyes. Those two had their own styles, Susie was doing what Alice always preferred, stealing hearts, meanwhile Boris was just using predominately brute force to get what he wanted... or, rather, he was trying to use brute force.

"Shesh," Boris muttered, clutching his hurting wrist. "I'm pretty sure this host coulda used t' go to the gym sometime, this body is so weak! Ugh, and how many meals was he skipping? Kid, your body's starving."

"Sammy was never exactly the strongest of men," Susie said with a shrug. "If you're so concerned, you could go to the gym to bulk up."

Boris looked up at her, standing up to stretch since he had been kneeling over bodies for so long. He smirked slightly. "If I had time for that, I'd have had time to convince him," he stated. "Reminds me, I still have to cage that little weakling."

Susie sighed, turning away from him. "I wouldn't underestimate that body, if I were you," she said softly. "Sammy may not have been the strongest man in the building, but he wasn't the weakest either."

Boris shrugged. He turned away and stared down at the body of the still living and whimpering human below him, pulling back his fist to punch them in the face just to make them quiet. He let out a slight groan of pain, pulling his hand back to himself to clutch his wrist. "This is one of the bodies that are just super skinny, isn't it?" he sighed. "Great. Guess I gotta get a new tactic before I accidentally kill it."

His eyes spotted something hanging on the wall, grin growing as he realized what it was. Perfect~. He lunged for it, grabbing it then immediately cutting someone's head off with it. "Perfect~," he purred, looking over the ax in his hands. "Quick, silent, and _deadly~_."

.~.~.~.

Just like the other two, Joey had his own style. Unlike the other two, who had just been using their hands, he was luring people aside with a promise of safety then plunging a knife deep inside their chests or necks. He couldn't manage to stifle the cackle from leaving his throat.

By the end of the day, every other employee in the building had been murdered by the three of them. Joey made his way back to the other two, finding them both covered in blood and relaxing, Susie casually snacking on a heart while she was at it. Sammy -no, Boris, he still wasn't used to it yet- was playing with an ax as if it was just a toy.

"Well, friends," Joey began. "We are far on our way to taking over the world!"

"About that."

Joey froze, he and Boris both turning to look at Susie. "I've been thinking," the woman continued. "Three people can't rule the entire world, there can only be one," she explained what she had been thinking about. She smiled. "Now, I'm willing to be equal with you while we take over, but once we're in power, I accept your worship as your queen~."

"Our queen?" Boris growled. He stood up and stalked towards her. "Like _**HELL**_ you will be!"

"Calm down! Both of you!" Joey yelled. He pinched his nose and sighed. This wasn't the easiest of tasks, not that he really expected everything to be easy, even after assembling the group. This was the first time in centuries that the three were together in the same place at the same time, there was no way to know that they could hate each other. Besides, _**HE**_ was going to be the ruler, the other two could be his harem or kept in prison for all he cared.

"Alright, listen," he began. "We've got a lot of things to do, let's focus more on the present and discuss the future later. We'll burn that bridge as we cross it."

Susie and Boris exchanged glances before nodding in agreement.

"Fine," Boris agreed. "I have just one request, though."

Nothing could be simple, could it? "Alright then, what is it?" Joey asked, trying to maintain a leader status as he kept his voice level and a smile on his face.

"Please ask Alice...Susie...whichever to stop eyeing me that way."

Joey froze and turned to look at Susie, noticing that she was, in fact, eyeing Boris oddly. ...Wait... didn't Alice have a tendency to... oh, no. "Susie, please," he sighed. "We need Boris alive."

Susie looked shocked at his words. "I-I wasn't...I..." She stuttered.

"It's okay," Boris replied. "That wasn't you, Susie, that was Alice," he turned away from the two, starting to walk away. "We should have known she'd never change," he muttered.

Joey watched him leave and sighed lightly.

.~.~.~.

His footsteps echoed loudly down the now empty halls, the plain colors of the studio transforming to the rotting wood of the abandoned building they were accustomed to meeting in at this point. His paws trod along the floor softly, claws lightly clicking as he stepped.

He stopped at the foot of a structure covered in cloth and laid down, gently lowering the unconscious form of the human he took over to the floor. The human spent a few hours in denial then spent even more time screaming, the noise in the back of his mind like static for so long, but then they mercifully passed out and he took to carrying them by their shirt collar like a puppy.

He yanked down on the cloth cover and hooked a claw on the mettle bars to open the cage. Carrying the human in his mouth for so long was dangerous, way too many ways to accidentally bring great harm upon them, as much as he knew they wouldn't like the cage, it was safer for them and keep them further out of his way.

He gently placed them inside and a chain attached itself to their ankle so they'd be even less likely to escape.

Overall, it was a nice cage. The mettle was painted gold to make it look even fancier than it actually was, though since it was more of an illusion in their shared mind, it might as well been real gold. There was plenty of room to move, both length wise and height wise. There was even a swing hanging from the ceiling and chains of toys in case the human got bored, practically luxurious. He was even thinking of putting in a hammock at some point, but for now the blankets at the bottom would do.

He took one last look at the human before he had to leave. It been so long since he'd seen them this serene, their dirty-blond hair gently framing their face as they slept so peacefully. Really, the last time he'd seen them so calm was back when they were just a teenager attending their first session to try to meet him, and then the men showed up and he may have gotten a little crazy.

He didn't have time to think more, he had to get back to reality before Alice stole his heart or something. He just needed to make sure the human was safe before returning to the real world. He closed the cage door, the cage locking itself as he did so. Now it was time to go.

"Sleep well, Sammy," he whispered as he faded away from this nonexistent world, leaving the human to sleep peacefully, forever caged away.

* * *

{~ "Treaded" is not a word, the past tense of "Tread" is "Trod" or "Trodden". My mind is blown! ~}


	10. Confrontations

Henry couldn't believe the phone call he received, a frantic call from the organization that was supposed to be taking care of Sammy and Susie. Note the 'supposed to' part of it, since they weren't doing that. The place they were kept was destroyed like a criminal came in looking for something and ransacked the place, all the occupants found laying dead all over the place and neither of the two found.

The suspicions were confirmed true, they were two of the Legendary Spirits' hosts. That meant they were free, probably with the third. And he had an idea of just where the two escaped to.

Right after he got he got the call, he hopped into his car and drove off towards the studio. If he was wrong, Joey would be mad at him for returning, but if he was right... if he was right he had to get out quickly and call the people for help again. He didn't want to believe that the two could be dangerous, maybe a little intimidating if they were in bad moods, but not dangerous. Sadly, if what he was told was true, they were. Highly.

He pulled his into a parking space and got out, walking towards the building when he froze. Was that... blood... oozing out of under the door? Upon closer inspection, it was indeed blood. He ran to a window and peered inside.

Bodies lied everywhere, their blood forming a pool that completely covered the floor. He was too late to stop anything from happening. For the first time in who-knows-how-long, the three Legendary Spirits were gathered in the same place, and they were leaving a massacre in their wake everywhere they went.

Movement in the background caught his eye, causing him to look up from the field of death that was the main room to see a figure walking in. The figure appeared to be a little smaller than him, and blond. Sammy. He wanted to smile and let out a sigh of relief to see one of the people he was looking for was okay, but he knew this was too easy.

Sammy looked up at him, seeing him through the window. Faster than Henry'd ever see him run before, he raced to the door, moving as if he was teleporting there. The door flew open and he lunged at him.

"Sammy! Calm down! It's me!" Henry cried, causing Sammy to pause and stare at him. "We're friends, remember! If you're mad at me for calling those people, I'm sorry!"

Sammy just froze and stared at him. "You... you knew him," he whispered. "Oh my go- I am so, so sorry!" His words made Henry freeze as well but he didn't seem to notice. "I didn't want to, but he was just so unwilling! I had no choice!"

"You're... you're not Sammy?" Henry asked, quieting him at last.

"No... well... yes... it's complicated," Not-Sammy sighed, leaning against the wall. "Don't worry, Sammy's perfectly fine and safe. I swear I wanted things to go smoother like Bendy and Alice's meetings with their hosts, but he was just not having any of that, I had no choice but to take over myself and lock him away. But really, he's fine!" he insisted again.

Henry continue to stare at him in confusion. "So you're... Boris?" he asked at last, trying to piece everything together. He received a nod and wasn't sure whether he should feel relieved or more worried. Well, at least the spirit said Sammy was safe, so he didn't have to worry about him, he just had to worry about... him. "And Sammy is...?"

Boris sighed, looking down sadly. "Like I said, locked away," he explained. "I swear he's fine though. I didn't hurt him in the least. No one has hurt him."

Henry nodded in understanding. "Well... as long as he's safe, I guess," he said, looking back at Boris. "Now, you do know what I have to do, right?" He asked as started to back away, heading back to his car.

"I know," Boris answered with a nod. "You have to go tell the organization our whereabouts and send them to 'pick us up', and we'll have to kill them and continue our plight to take over the entire world."

Henry tensed up as Boris spoke. Damn, he was right. The three had caused two massacres already, he didn't need to send them more people for another one. But if he didn't, they'd get out and start destroying the entire town, eventually spreading their onslaught to the world, so he still had to anyway. The decision was a tough one, but he knew what he needed to do was not the answer he wanted to choose.

He got in his car and drove off, turning on his car-phone. It was nearly the end of the world, he could make a call in the car. If he didn't, he would die anyway. The phone soon connected to the organization, the voice of an agent coming in fairly clear through it. "Uh... hi, this is Henry," he greeted when an officer spoke to him. "Listen, I found them. They're hiding in the studio. They've killed everyone else in the entire studio as well."

"Understood," the officer replied. "We'll get our best men and best weapons to take them down. Thank you for telling us." The officer hung up before Henry could speak with him further, despite how much Henry wanted to warn him to find another way, a better way.

He started to drive back to his house but a thought struck his mind. He took a left instead of a right and changed his destination, going straight to the library instead of home. When they were kids, he and Joey went to the library to look up the Legendary Spirits because of the organization visiting their school to look for them. Now he needed to do that again to see if he could find a way to stop them.

.~.~.~.

Susie sat down at a table in the cafeteria part of the studio, gently stirring her tea before taking a sip. She swore she wasn't usually this violent, but the two blood-baths she was a part of told otherwise. Still... earlier...

 _"Please ask Alice...Susie...whichever to stop eyeing me that way."_

His words still rang through her head. She didn't even notice that she was staring at him like she wanted to pin him down and rip him open in some twisted mad-scientist type fashion. He was her friend... well, the host was her friend anyway, she'd never want to hurt him! Why was she looking at him like that?

Then he had insisted that it wasn't her fault at all, that it was just something about Alice that made her do that. She didn't do research on the spirits, Sammy did, and he wasn't going to answer her now on what Boris meant by that.

Her mind went back to the countless bodies that she left behind her, all with their chests ripped open and heart removed. Was that... was that also Alice? She, herself, never thought of doing that before. It wasn't a fighting style that crossed her mind much, not that fighting or killing had crossed her mind much at all before.

She looked up to see Joey and Boris walk in to get lunch as well. Joey started getting coffee first while Boris went straight for the fridge, putting together a sandwich. They had a busy morning, murdering their former-coworkers and all, so it appeared that all of them had worked up an appetite of sorts.

"Boris," Joey began, causing Susie to look up from her thoughts and return to reality. Boris, too, looked up to listen to him as Joey continued. "You're in a human body. A tiny human body. You literally can't eat that much."

Susie turned her attention over to the sandwich Boris had built. It wasn't extreme per-say, but it was bigger than she knew Sammy would ever be able to eat, seeing how skinny he always was.

Boris sighed and cut it in half, storing the other half in the fridge. "My last host wasn't nearly this thin," he commented. "He could have handled it."

"Yes, well, Sammy's a very thin body type," Joey replied, clearly rolling his eyes. His voice even sounded like an eye-roll, he was very much tired of dealing with the hellhound he worked so hard to find. "If you want to spend your day in the bathroom, throwing up everything, have at it, I won't stop you. But if you want to actually be of use to us, pay attention to your body."

Boris opened and closed his mouth to mimic talking, rolling his eyes and walking away with half the sandwich he made.

.~.~.~.

"Greetings, Susie."

Susie walked up to the fallen angel, who sat upon her throne like some sort of a ruler. In the plane where they could meet their spirits, the nonexistent world in their subconscious they entered, they could be where ever the wanted. Today, the fallen angel had chosen it to look more like a palace than their usual building.

"What brings you here, sweetie?" Alice asked, leaning on her arm and smiling at her warmly.

"I needed to ask you a question," Susie began. She took a deep breath and tried to rethink what she wanted to ask. She looked up at Alice, the angel seemed very interested in what she had to say. "It's just... It's about the murders recently that we've been doing," she explained nervously.

Alice smiled and nodded lightly. "Ah, what is it that you wanted to ask about it?" she inquired. She didn't seem at all concerned by the question. In fact, she seemed... pleased.

Susie sighed and took a deep breath. "Well... the way that we've been ripping out people's hearts... is that... is that you're way of...?" She wasn't sure how to word it exactly, thankfully the angel seemed to understand anyway.

"Ah, yes, that's my way of dealing with things," Alice answered. "A delightful way of murder, if I'm being honest with you. There are a great many of other ways, and I keep finding more as the years go on, but the old standby has always been my personal favorite. Was that what you wanted to know?"

Susie nodded excitedly, happy that the angel was so wiling to answer her question. "There is one other thing," she added softly. Now she was really nervous. "The way that we've been looking at Sammy, well, Boris," she began. "What is with that? Do you and Boris have a history or something?"

"Well, you could say that we have a history," Alice replied, voice changing a little scornfully. "It's an off and on thing. Sometimes, we get along wonderfully, we're practically inseparable, like with our previous hosts. But other times, we don't. Boris tends to feel a bit bad if the host is unwilling to help, it makes him feel like he's constantly harming them, so he's not always that helpful. Last time, the host was overjoyed to be with him, but this time, not so much."

"So you're blaming the murderous look we've been giving him on his caring for his host?" Susie asked. Maybe a hint of resentment made it to her voice, that wasn't intentional but she wasn't too thrilled with what the angel answered with. The angel had spoke as if she didn't care so much if her host didn't agree with her and would be perfectly fine bringing great harm upon her host and one of the other hosts.

Alice look at her in shock before standing up. "Oh, my dear Susie," she began, walking towards her. "That's not what I'm saying at all," she explained, her voice softer and sweet and fake sounding. "It's just that Boris and I tend to fight when that happens and, well, I may or may not be the reason he reincarnates so much more than the rest of us~," she laughed lightly.

Susie looked at her in shock and began backing away. "You mean... you mean you kill him?" she asked, voice shaking. "You kill him and the host body so he has to reincarnate?" She continued to stare at her before her eyes narrowed angrily. "Listen!" she hissed. "I don't care what we do to anyone else, but Sammy's my friend! We are not hurting him in any way, shape, or form, got that?!"

Alice was taken aback by the action but soon regained composure. "Fine," she agreed. "Whatever, I'll stop planning to rip that stupid hound to shreds if it makes you happy."

"It does," Susie replied. She turned away and began to leave again, anger radiating off her in visible streams. No one, and she meant no one, harmed her friends and got away with it.


	11. The Dead Will Rise

The swing creaked as it slowly swung back and forth, a sad movement for the sad person perched upon it. Ever so lightly, a movement of his foot set it into motion just as it slowed down again, only ever going for one single swing. His blond hair fell into his face, hiding it from the little light there was in this prison. His thin hands gripped the chains that held up the bar that was the swing.

His prison, while be it preferred over being held in the creature mouth, was rather demeaning. It was a giant bird cage, one that he would give a pet bird but he was **_not_** a pet bird, he was a _**human**_! Still, he had to admit, there was something oddly enjoyable about the chain of toys hanging from the top of the cage, it made interesting sounds.

Outside his cage, he could just barely see the window and the world beyond it. Now that things had calmed down, now that he had been captured, the forest was no longer on fire and the building was starting to look a bit nicer. The trees outside were even starting to gain some life, like it was spring.

He wanted nothing more than to go out to the woods and hide amongst the trees, maybe even climb a tree and sit there for a few hours, it been years since he did that. He used to do that a lot when he was younger and people would joke that he was a 'tree wolf' since his spirit animal was just a wolf at the time.

There was a light snoring sound in the air. The hellhound had returned since it was night time in the real world, the spirits returned to this subconscious world to sleep. Far across the room from him was the creature itself, curled up on it's side like a giant dog with his legs moving, probably in a dream. He envied that hound for sleeping so well. Even when he passed out, his sleep wasn't so welcomed.

Still, he was bored of this place already. The cage was big, true, but it was still a cramped, confined space and he wanted out. He jumped down from the perch and sat down in the nest of blankets that was his bed, straightening it out so he could lay down. He didn't want to sleep, but he didn't want to stay awake either.

He curled up and slowly closed his eyes, his mind only longing for freedom. It took a little while, but eventually he was swept away to the world of dreams, blissfully away from this world of darkness and into a world of the freedom he so desired.

.~.~.~.

Earlier that day, Henry walked into the library and up to the librarian. He had been working for so long, he hadn't had time to go to the library. He walked up to the desk, waiting for a librarian to walk out.

"Can I help you with anything?" a kind elderly woman asked, walking out of the backroom.

"Yes," Henry answered politely. "I need to see every book you have containing any form of information regarding the Legendary Spirits."

The woman began searching for references of the books he described, writing a list for him to use to look around. She smiled at him brightly and handed him the list. "Here you are, deary."

"Thank you," Henry said as he took the list. Hopefully, one of the books would help him find a weakness or any way to down the three.

It took him only a short while to find the books on the list, digging in as fast as possible and skimming through them. He didn't have time to read in depth, he needed to find information he didn't know on how to handle the three and stop them without bringing any harm to their bodies, he didn't want to hurt his friends and coworkers.

The first article he found that had the three all together was someone's translation of hieroglyphics on the wall of a pharaohs tomb. The pharaoh was the host of Bendy and his wife was Alice, Boris was a servant who worked for him. The three hosts had fused with the spirits. Their downfall? Alice poisoned Bendy so she'd be the ruler of the kingdom, Boris lead a rebellion to defeat her and killed her, then Boris was killed by scared townspeople.

The next time the three were together was thousands of years later. This time, they were getting along well, in Mid-evil Europe. Their downfall here? The freaking _plague_. All three had died of the plague. Henry almost had to laugh about that.

The third time the three were together was back in Salem a long time ago... during the Salem Witch Trials. They had switched out with their poor hosts just in time to be tried, the three normal humans scared and screaming as they went through the trials. In the end, the townspeople decided the three were possessed by demons, and they weren't wrong, they were just too late. All three were put to death anyway.

There was only one other time when they were working together, but that was also short lived as they were all poisoned by the people they enslaved. Other than that, their downfall was always something more disturbing.

Their usual downfall was Alice killing Boris. Henry's mind flashed over to the carnage left behind in Alice's wake, all the dead bodies with their chests ripped open. He couldn't help but picture the two as Susie and Sammy, the mental image of Susie killing Sammy made him cringe though.

He sighed, looking down at the books. All the times they had been defeated so far, they were killed. There were several things wrong with that. The first being that while the hosts weren't exactly innocent, any of the three of them, they would have been if not for the demons in their minds anyway, they didn't deserve to die for that. The other reason was that the demons just reincarnated in new bodies each time, there was no keeping them dead.

It was hopeless. The only way he could see out of this was killing his friends, and that was the last thing he wanted to do. Unless...

How could he not have seen this before? The spirits were demons! The demon, the hellhound, and the fallen angel, all three came from Hell. A smile came to his face as he realized that. If they came from Hell, they could be sent **back** to Hell. All he needed to do was fined a priest willing to assist him.

.~.~.~.

Susie felt a smirk spread across her face. She peered out the window to see the military-like trucks and vans pulling up to the studio, people from the organization piling out and approaching the studio. "Oh, joy~," she cackled. "More people to play with~!"

Boris was still asleep on some chairs nearby, but her words began to stir him awake. He sat up and groggily ran his fingers through his hair. He walked over to stand beside her at the window like a zombie, or a teenager first waking up in the morning. "So I guess Henry did send them," he muttered, voice crackling a little and slightly hard to understand.

Susie turned to stare at him. "Henry sent them?" she asked. "You mean... Henry was here and you never told us?!"

He looked at her in alarm at first before sighing. "Yeah, Henry visited yesterday," he explained.

"And you just let him go?!"

"Well, it didn't matter if he lived or not!" Boris growled. "We've killed everyone who's messed with us so far, it didn't matter!"

Susie fumed for a second before forcing composure upon herself. This was fine! He was right, they could easily handle everything thrown at them. But she still couldn't help but question their recent actions. All this death, this destruction... this wasn't her, was it? When she was younger, she never even dreamed of causing so much trouble.

And the others? She couldn't speak for Joey but Sammy was content staying away from everyone and hanging out in the music room at school during breaks. She used to join him, she'd sing while he played the music. He was an introvert who just loved doing chill things on his own or with only a very small group of people. He never showed signs of trouble either.

Well, aside from the time he got in a fight at school and the one he fought was hurt far worse than he was. The older and bigger boy that he was fighting was sent to the infirmary with scratches covering every inch of his visible body, long and deep and three in a row, which was odd since by all accounts, it should have been four in a row. Sammy had the normal amount of fingers, after all, and he was a wolf, wolves attack with their teeth or they swipe with their paws. The other boy didn't look at all like a wolf attack, but maybe some other creature.

She turned away from the window, walking off. She could feel Boris watching her leave, but she didn't feel the need to explain herself to him or anything. It was like he said, it didn't matter if the men stormed in or not. They could handle anything thrown at him, no problem.

.~.~.~.

He was so bored! The cage was cramped and dull, despite how big it was, and everything inside it had quickly lost it's charm. The toys were no longer that interesting to him, the swing perch was the most interesting and even it wasn't that fun anymore.

He may have been screaming in frustration because he heard footsteps approach and a voice start talking to him. "Not having much fun here, Sammy-boy~?" Bendy asked, walking up to his cage. "Ah, what a shame."

"The way you say that," Sammy muttered. "Can you get me out or something?"

"I'm glad you asked~!" Bendy replied. "I can't get you out exactly, but I can spice things up a bit!" He waved his hand and the toys hanging from the ceiling switched out for new ones, more toys appearing at the bottom of the cage. Along with the toys, a small tree-like structure with more toys and things hanging from it appeared.

"One last thing," he said, holding up a finger near his smirk. "'Boris said he was thinkin' of adding a hammock in here," he added as one also appeared. "There, that's better!"

Sammy looked around. He had to admit, the new additions were actually a bit exciting to him, even though they were all typical bird things aside from the hammock. He looked back at Bendy and was met with a smirk.

"No need to thank me~!" Bendy said with a happy laugh. "Anything for a friend of my hosts! And don't worry, I'll make sure nothing happens to you! I'll take care of you from now on, okay~?"

He wasn't sure how exactly to answer so he nodded.

.~.~.~.

Boris watched the men storm the building. Susie had left him before they got inside, Joey was in the machine room, it was just him and the dead bodies left to deal with the men. Luckily, he had a trick that the others didn't have. Possession.

Just as the men started to get close to him, the dead began to rise and charge them, all with every single one of his abilities and fighting styles. It was like an army of himself, and every person involved became another Boris. It was a technique he so loved to use but didn't often get the chance to, he really needed to thank Henry for providing him with that chance.

A dark chuckle left his throat as he watch his personal army attack the people who came here to deal with him. He waved his hand and the dead from the next room over began to return to life as well. There was a familiar feeling about someone in the room... like he knew one of them.

He tried to think on it. Surely there were people here his host knew, maybe it was someone he was close to? But who were they? Why did he feel this attachment to a few people? Well, he'd just have to keep an eye on the people he felt the attachment to, not that much harm could come to dead.

Just as he was about to call his second army over, he felt an arm wrap around his shoulders and a teaser at his head. Well... that would leave a mark, wouldn't it? He wouldn't die from it, true, but he would be in pain and captured, and he'd rather not be either right now but not being in pain was preferable.

He held up his arms in surrender, looking down in defeat.

* * *

{~ I always seem to run into fics where Bendy and/or Joey add 'boy' to the end of someone's name and all I can ever think is of Pegasus in Yu-Gi-Oh! with his "Yugi-boy" and "Kaiba-boy". And if anyone's curious, the zombies Boris called upon were a reference to the dead Borises Alice had littering the place in Chapter 3 of the game. ~}


	12. Priestly Assistance

Henry couldn't believe how long he was spending trying to find a priest to help him out. How was he supposed to know there was a mass today? It took long enough to find a priest, and now he was sitting outside waiting for the mass to be over.

He couldn't help the panic, the sense of urgency for the future. His pager went off and he picked it up to stop the incessant beeping, looking at the words on the screen. It was from the organization. He couldn't believe what he saw. They actually stormed the studio!

"We caught one," the text read. "We caught Boris."

For the eightieth time, he wished he could send messages back with a pager, but that wasn't how that worked. He pocketed the small device again, holding his head in his head. He just hoped they'd quit while they were ahead. They captured one, that was all they needed to slow things down. But, knowing them, they'd keep going until every single one of them died.

The doors opened and people began to leave. Perfect, it wouldn't be long before he could talk to the priest!

.~.~.~.

The handcuffs twirled around his fingertips. Technically, they were supposed to be around his wrists, but he found that too dull. Besides, he was locked in the back of a military van and heavily guarded on the outside, he could feel the presence of multiple men, it wasn't like he was going to escape.

The screaming in his head died down a while ago, that was nice. He could only assume that Bendy went to deal with the human for him. He really wasn't sure why Bendy was so interested in the human, he was just a weak, skinny human, there wasn't much he could do.

Still, he wouldn't necessarily complain. The human was calm and quiet again, that was most of what mattered to him. He didn't like having to steal this body from them, but the constant screaming got on his nerves quickly.

The doors opened and the man who seemed to be in charge of the entire operation gave him a look of annoyance. "Really?" the man muttered. He reached in and took the handcuffs from him with a grunt before climbing in, doors closing behind him. "Now, I need to ask you a few questions regarding your friends-"

"Oh, we're not friends," Boris replied. "This is the longest we've gone without killing each other and it's been three days, we're not friends. In fact, once we take over the world, I'll kill both of them and rule it myself, maybe I'll enslave their hosts as my servants, make it so they never know~!" he smirked as he explained. "They've done it to me enough time, it's time they learn how it feels."

"Well, I'm sorry I have to tell you this but that future will never happen," the man replied. "We can, however, offer you something in return for the information it takes to shut down the other two."

He looked up at him, thinking it over. On the one hand, if he betrayed them, they'd never take over the world. On the other hand, however, he'd been waiting so long to betray them again and get revenge for the many times they'd done that to him, telling him to be the dog at their feet. A new smirk came to his lips. "We draw power the more people we kill," he explained. "Alice is having some troubles with her host, her host is conflicted. And Bendy's host is mad his best friend left."

The man smiled back at him. "Thank you for your cooperation," he said, turning to leave. He stared at the handcuffs in his hand before sighing. "Yeah, we won't even try with these anymore," he muttered, exiting the vehicle.

.~.~.~.

Joey entered the main room them quickly moved back behind a wall to remain unseen. The place was filled with agents and the dead bodies were all moving around the room, wandering aimlessly, it was clear that they had become zombies under Boris's control, but the hellhound was no where to be seen.

That wasn't a good sign. He mentally called for Bendy and the demon appeared before him, but no one else would see him. "What's going on?" he hissed to him. "Where's Boris?"

"Well, it looks like Boris got himself caught," Bendy answered. "I wouldn't worry too much about it, I mean, I got a handle on both him and his host! He'd be an idiot to betray us!"

They heard the door open and a man walk in. "Alright, I talked to him," the man who just entered called to everyone. "Looks like there's some emotional things going on around here."

"The idiot betrayed us," Bendy uttered in shock. "In all our years and lives, I've almost never seen Boris betray us!"

Joey sighed, bringing a hand up to his forehead gently. "We better go find Susie and Alice and plan our attack," he muttered. "This is a minor setback, nothing more."

.~.~.~.

It took forever, but mass was finally over, as was the confession time, which Henry didn't realize was right after mass. Finally, he was able to talk with the priest and tell him what all was going on at the studio now. To his surprise, the priest agreed to help him. He actually expected the priest to say no and he'd have to find someone new, but the man agreed.

Now, Henry was in the car, driving himself and the priest over to the studio. "You sure seem calm about this, Father," he stated. "Actually, you seem kinda... excited."

"Of course," the priest replied with a smile. "Most people never get invited to a task like this, it's a once in a lifetime event! And with the help of God, I'm sure we can handle this."

Henry was surprised the man was as okay with this as he was but he wasn't going to argue with it. He knew he just needed to be happy he found someone who was at least willing to help, even if he, himself, was unsure if this plan would actually work or not.

They arrived at the studio to see the parking lot filled with the military vehicles of the organization, men also all over guarding the place and one of the vans, he could only guess that van was where Boris was. He had to park on the road due to how crowded the parking lot was.

They stepped out and an agent approached them. "Henry, Father," he called, showing as much respect as he could towards the priest.

"Hey," Henry greeted. "Can you take us to see Boris?"

"Of course!" The agent answered. He began to lead them to the heavily guarded van, just like Henry thought he would, gesturing for the guards to let them enter. Sure enough, the doors opened to reveal the hellhound in his friend's body.

"This is Boris," Henry explained, gesturing to him as he spoke to the priest. "He's controlling his hosts body."

Boris looked up and waved. He seemed pleased until his eyes landed on the priest, then he jumped back. "What's he doing here?" he asked nervously.

"I figured out that you three are all from Hell, maybe we could send you back," Henry explained. "Nothing personal, you seem like a nice wolf, it's just that you and the others are destroying everything, killing everyone, and you're possessing my friend without his consent."

Boris backed up farther. "No... no no no, I was promised better!" he cried. "I was told I'd get better for betraying them and I did! I was supposed to get better than this! You can't do this to me!" As he continued ranting, he turned his attention back to them and began crouching in preparation to attack.

He began to lunge at them but got held back by two agents. "No!" he cried. "Let me go! You all promised me better than this! If you do this, you'll never get Sammy back!"

Henry froze. This would kill Sammy, too? No... he didn't want to hurt either of them, just send one back to Hell and return the other to his body. "What did you just say?" he asked, hoping he misheard.

"You heard me," Boris replied. "You banish me, you'll never get him out. He'll be locked in that cage for all eternity without me there to let him out! His body will rot and die and it will all be your fault!"

"Hurry up and do it!" One of the agents yelled over him.

"He's lying, just do it!" the other added.

"If I may," the one that lead them there began to add. "If we don't do this, everyone will die. I'm sorry, sir, but you're going to have to risk loosing him."

Henry stood back and watched as the priest began the exorcism, mind buzzing with the question of if he could get Sammy back. The hellhound continued to scream and try to fight it, and that was certainly not helping him feel better about it, but no one could stop it now.

Soon enough, it was over and Boris stopped fighting entirely, his body falling slack against the arms of the two agents. They laid him out and checked for a pulse. "He's alive!" one called out to try to calm Henry. But something about that still didn't make him feel any better.

Henry walked over and sat down next to the unconscious body, looking at him for any signs of waking up at all. "Boris wasn't lying, was he?" he asked nervously.

.~.~.~.

Something was wrong. Sammy raced over to the door of the cage, reaching his arm out trying to feel the lock. He could see the door start to fuse with the rest of the cage before, he hoped that was an illusion. He couldn't find a lock, the lock had completely vanished! He panicked as he realized what that meant.

Luckily, the footsteps that he now recognized as Bendy's began to approach again. "I have some bad new and some good news for you," Bendy explained, walking up to him with a calm smile. "Boris seems to be gone. That may sound good for you, except that means you're stuck here forever~."

Sammy stared up at him in terror. He was trapped. He'd never get out. No... no he wanted to get out. He wanted to be free again!

"Now, I can help you out, but I don't think you want my help," Bendy continued, turning away. "I just came to tell you, I'll leave you now."

"No! Please!" Sammy cried, reaching towards him through the bars. "Please! Help me! I'll do anything just don't leave me here!"

Bendy turned with a smile. "I thought you'd never ask~."

.~.~.~.

The agents had gone inside to see if they could deal with Bendy and Alice, now that one of their numbers was gone so they were unable to draw more power. Henry and the priest stayed outside, Henry kneeling next to the body of his friend, who they decided was probably not actually coming back, and the priest offering his condolences.

To their surprise though, the body's eyes open and he sat up, staring around in terror before calming down. "It's worked," he whispered with a smile. "I- It actually worked. I'm free again!"

"Sammy?" Henry asked, reaching towards him, only to get his hand shoved away as Sammy stood up.

"I must go find my savior!" Sammy cried, running towards the studio. The agents guarding it reached out to catch him but he was too fast, slipping through the doors quickly despite anyone trying to stop him.

Henry and the priest just stared. The priest slowly reached into his pocket and pulled out a stack of business cards. "I can't help you with him," he uttered, handing the cards to Henry. "Here's some therapists, you'll need to call them to deal with him. I can't help you there."

Henry took the cards, putting them in his own pocket with a nod. All this time, that was the one thing he hadn't expected to deal with.

* * *

{~ Sammy's coming outta his cage and he's been doing just fine! ... If you count worshiping the demon controlling your employer as fine, that is. Anyway, everyone, please give a warm welcome to the crazy Sammy we all know and love from the game! He took his sweet time getting here but nevertheless, here he is!

Also, quick mention, I love the priest in this. I'm not Catholic though so I don't know if a confession would follow immediately after Mass, sorry if I messed up badly or anything.

Two chapters left, this will be finished posting-wise tomorrow.~}


	13. The Final Fight

Joey was almost surprised and happy to see who he believed to be Boris at this point run up to him, he thought for sure he was captured, he didn't expect to see him. But there was something different about him, that much was clear.

"Bendy!" "Boris" called, racing up to him.

"Stop him!" an agent at the door called, getting two agents to grab the arms of the host. "Bring him back out here to safety."

"Safety?" Joey asked, stepping out from the shadows with a grin as he watched them. "Is he not one of us? We wouldn't cause him any harm."

"He is, in fact, not one of you!" the agent answered, assisting in getting the host away from everyone. Interesting... now that he was looking, Joey didn't see any of the Boris possessed zombies pay even a little attention to him, almost as if they were just dazed, formerly dead people.

Henry appeared in the doorway as if he ran all the way over. "Sammy!" he called. He raced over to the host, wrapping his arms around him. "Don't do that! You scared me, dammit!"

Joey's face fell with realization. Boris wasn't there anymore, Sammy was in control, just acting odd. But how was that possible? And why was he acting this way.

A priest walked in through the door and looked around casually, answering Joey's question. He noticed Henry and Sammy and walked up to them, chatting with both of them for a moment. Joey just watched in shock. That meant... that meant Boris was just gone.

"Yeah, Boris got sent back to Hell," Bendy explained in his head. "I went and got Sammy out of his cage, so now he follows _me_ ~."

Joey didn't believe Bendy until he heard Sammy whining at Henry to let him go to his savior and master. At those words, he decided to play it up, walking closer with a bright smile. "Sammy!" he greeted. "Ah, I'm so glad to see you again!"

"Grab him!"

The words didn't even process through his mind before his arms were grabbed and held behind his back. He tried to fight back against the agents but then the priest started speaking and things felt weird. He could hear Bendy screaming and ranting in his head, and he, himself, was in some pain as well.

Soon it was over, whatever was happening to him, and he collapsed to the floor, handcuffs clicked around his wrists as he laid there. Strange... Bendy stopped screaming... he couldn't hear him at all anymore...

He looked up to see the priest closing his book, probably a Bible of some sort, he didn't see the cover. So... Bendy was sent back to hell as well. That meant... that meant they failed. Everything failed.

He looked up to see Henry still holding Sammy back, both looking worried. A smiled cracked across his lips. Even after their fight, Henry was still worried for him. Oh, well, he was going to jail now for willingly assisting in a couple massacres, he could expect to see at least Susie there as well. That was fine. Misery loves company.

.~.~.~.

Susie was confused. It had gotten awful quiet around the studio. She knew the organization was there, and she knew the boys had gone to deal with them, but it had now been quiet for an incredibly long time. Did the two of them kill everyone already?

"That's strange," Alice stated in her mind. "I can't sense either of them anymore. At first I couldn't sense Boris but now I can't sense Bendy either. It's like neither of them exist anymore."

Susie blinked in shock before standing up. Now she was curious and wanted to check it out. She left the area of the studio she claimed as her own and began to head towards the stairs, slowly making her way up all of them. Before long, she could hear people talking.

"Are you okay, Joey?" That voice... Henry. Henry was back?

"I'm fine, no thanks to you," Joey replied bitterly.

"Where's Bendy?" Sammy's voice, not that he was Sammy anymore. He was Boris, not Sammy, no matter how much she had started to miss him, he wasn't Sammy.

"Bendy is gone," Joey explained.

"B-"

"Whatever lies you were told were just that, lies!" Henry started. "Sammy, Bendy wasn't going to help you, he was trying to use you to get to Boris. Joey's been doing that for years!"

Wait... that was Sammy? Susie peered into the room to see Joey on the floor with his arms behind his back and Henry standing off to the side with Sammy, keeping the musician close to himself. She couldn't believe it. Bendy and Boris really were gone. Alice was the only one left.

"Oh, well," Alice muttered. "It's not like I really cared for either anyway. In fact, I should really thank them for clearing my path to victory for me! And I know just how to thank them, a fist through all of their chests!" She started laughing maniacally but Susie wasn't listening.

Susie walked out to face them, everyone turning to look at her like they were ready to fight, aside from Henry, Sammy, and Joey. Henry simply kept his arm around Sammy's shoulders to keep him close while Joey looked up to face her slightly. "You're back," she whispered, walking towards Henry and Sammy. She noticed the way Henry tensed up and even Sammy looked a little concerned, that hurt a little, but she brushed that aside and reached up to hug both of them. "I missed you guys," she uttered.

"It's... it's really you, Susie?" Henry asked, slowly relaxing as she didn't kill anyone. He still withdrew himself from the hug, trying and failing to take Sammy with him.

She could hear Alice in her head, yelling at her to take the opportunity to kill more people, that everyone had their guard down. But she didn't want to. She just wanted to stay hugging her friend for a little longer. Pity Alice didn't have the same interest.

Alice took over, she could feel it. It was terrifying, being grabbed from your own body and cast aside so someone else can take over. "No!" Susie screamed, but her voice went unheard. Alice was in full control, there was nothing she could do to stop her.

.~.~.~.

Alice began to snicker, arms wrapping tighter around Sammy's shoulders, he, in turn, tensing up and starting to attempt to leave. She didn't let him as she grabbed his arm and pulled him against her, back to her chest, like a hostage, a knife flying from her sleeve to her hand to hold at his neck.

Her laughter filled the room as everyone moved ready to strike if needed. "Now now, gentlemen," she began, keeping her voice low and sweet. "Wouldn't want me to kill this innocent host, would you~," she laughed. She began to back towards the machine room, dragging Sammy with her. All she needed was to get to the machine's amplifying power, then she could easily take everyone. Luckily, she knew Sammy was weaker than any of the spirits. Well, she thought he was.

To the surprise of everyone, Sammy was not as defenseless as they assumed as he grabbed her arm and ducked under it, twisting it and pushing her to send her across the room as he did so. "Y'know," he began. "Constantly being used is getting kinda old!"

"Hm... stronger than you look," Alice muttered, sitting up and wiping a little bit of blood from her nose on the back of her hand. She shifted so she was kneeling, feet planted firmly, holding her hands up above her hands. "I know when I've lost," she stated. "So, go ahead, arrest me. I surrender~."

The agents seemed a little suspicious but they still walked towards her. Big mistake as she pushed herself up on the ground and attacked in one swift motion, nails gliding through their throats to kill them. She lunged across the room, dodging any attack thrown at her, until she got to Sammy again.

"Hey there~," she whispered, looking at him with a grin that could rival Bendy as she latched onto his neck. "You're gonna pay for that, darling~!" She tightened her grip and geared up to deliver the final blow, only for a click behind her to get her attention.

"Drop him!" the leader of the organization commanded.

"Well, if you insist," Alice chuckled. She turned on her heel and threw her hostage into the man, toppling him and probably giving the musician a concussion. "That should keep you two out for a while," she muttered, turning her attention over to Henry. "Now, on to the man who sold out all of us~."

Two knives formed into ink in her hands as she lunged for him. She moved back an arm, ready to strike. Henry was defenseless, there was nothing he could possibly do to stop her. At this point, she knew she had won. Surely, no one could stop her now. She was practically queen already!

The next thing she saw was the flat side of an ax in front of her face, no time to stop her self from running into it. She fell to the floor and look up to see Sammy standing in front of Henry with the ax in his hands. So, he wasn't as unconscious as she thought he was. She looked up at his face, surprised to see the look of terror and how much he looked like he would pass out any time.

Henry walked forward and wrapped an arm around Sammy's shoulder, gently taking the ax from him. He held Sammy closer, attempting to protect him from Alice, as well as calm him down. It seemed to be helping since Sammy started to relax.

"I suppose you think that's going to stop me?" Alice asked with a laugh. She started to stand up but found herself kneeling again as Henry held the ax to her face again.

"Stay down," Henry said, his voice soft despite the order he gave.

"You wouldn't dare kill me," Alice replied with a smirk.

"I don't have to," Henry replied.

The priest walked up and Alice stared up at him. Oh... so that was what exactly happened to Bendy and Boris.

.~.~.~.

Henry stood back as the agents were filling out. A few stayed behind to talk to the dead people who Boris brought back and were now just roaming the place. It wasn't that the zombies were mindless, more that they were still dazed and confused from coming back from the dead.

Several agents were escorting Susie and Joey to a van, containing them until the police showed up to deal with their crimes. Sammy wasn't going with them because he was forced into it and had very little control of his actions. Instead, Sammy was sitting with the priest on a bench in front of the studio itself.

Henry turned to look to look at the two. He couldn't hear them over the noise, but the priest looked like he was happily talking about something and Sammy seemed okay to be listening to him. Considering the fight before, there was also an agent stationed near them watching to make sure that Sammy didn't start acting weird or pass out from when he got thrown.

"We've called the hospital about the people inside and Mr. Lawrence," the leader said, walking up to Henry. "Some doctors will arrive shortly, we'll help get everyone to the hospital and let them deal with it."

Henry nodded softly, turning to look at him "How about you?" he asked. "Are you okay from the fight?"

"I'll see a chiropractor," the man replied. "I'll be fine." He turned and began to leave. "Just keep an eye on and take care of your friend there." With that, he returned to his own vehicle and drove off, probably never to interact with Henry or anyone else from the studio ever again.

Henry walked over to Sammy and the priest. Sammy was fast asleep by the time he got there, wrapped in a trauma blanket that he was provided with after the fight. Henry was a little concerned but the priest assured him that he was fine, he slowly fell asleep rather than fainting or anything.

"Any plans as to what you're going to do now?" the priest asked, gently closing the Bible in his lap in order to speak with him. He smiled as if nothing bad had happened, but his eyes showed that he knew full well what had gone down in the studio.

"I'm honestly unsure," Henry sighed, leaning against a wall. "I mean, my best friend's going to jail, the studio we started together's gonna have to be shut down, I'm not sure where I should go from here."

The priest smiled lightly at him. "Life goes on and I am confident you will find your path in it," he assured him. He reopened his Bible to a page and pulled out a business card that seemed to have been marking the page, handing the card to Henry. "Should you ever wish to talk or stop by, my door's always open."

Henry took the card, looking over it then looking at him. "You just carry this around with you?" he laughed.

"You never know when you'll need to extend an invitation," the priest replied with a laugh of his own.


	14. Life Goes On

After Joey went to jail and all the previously dead people were released from the hospital, Henry decided to reopen the studio. Due to the owner being in jail, Henry became the new owner and manager of the place. And soon after the doctors agreed to it, Sammy joined him, taking the place in his life that he was once to Joey, now with just more breaks for therapy.

Susie was technically in jail, but she was doing fairly well. A therapist was thinking that she could be released on good behavior with community service. In the mean time, Alison was replacing her as the voice of Alice. Sammy preferred Susie as her voice, but wasn't going to argue due to previous events.

Overall, he was pretty happy running the studio. He was going to need to hire a new artist to replace him, he couldn't keep drawing while managing everything and Sammy could only help him so far with that since he was still the music director. But it wasn't like he was pushing it too much, after the events at the studio, no one expected new episodes that quickly. In fact, the cartoon was on hiatus while they worked more.

Everything seemed to be going well now. The world hadn't ended, the dead employees were alive again, Sammy was doing well in therapy, everything seemed to be improving.

There was a knock at his office door, the door opening and Sammy leaning in. "Hey," he greeted, Henry giving him the same as a response. "Wally and Thomas want to talk to you about what they should do with the machine."

Henry stood up and followed him out of the room. Ah, yes. The machine. The most worthless device in the entire studio. The stupid thing was put in just to boost the strength of the Legendary Spirits, and they were sent back to Hell, the machine had no further purpose in the building.

Sammy accompanied him as he went out to talk to Wally and Thomas, clipboard in hand as he assisted managing him most of the time. Currently, the clipboard was filled with notes as to what they needed to do. He was still writing music, of course, in fact some sheets were mixed in with the notes, but he also helped Henry as much as needed.

Both of them entered the room with the machine, Sammy looking a bit concerned as he gazed up at him. Henry didn't have any experience with the machine so he was mostly just annoyed with its presence, Sammy had first hand experience that he didn't wish to have a second time.

Henry stared up at the machine. Overall, it was just an ugly waste of space and he couldn't think of a single reason to keep it, but he couldn't think of a way to get rid of it either. "Does the machine serve any purpose besides the one it was used for?" he asked, turning to look between Sammy, Wally, and Thomas. Surely one of the three of them had a clue.

"Honestly, even after lookin' through it, I still can't find a use," Wally explained, cleaning his wrench bitterly. "It's got pipes connected around the building, and it's filled with ink, but it's not like the thing makes the stuff, so we can't figure it out either."

"Mr. Hill referred to it as an 'ink machine'," Sammy explained. "We found the blueprints for it and we contacted him, but he was as vague as he possibly could be. He gives his condolences over what happened, by the way, and he insists he had nothing to do with it."

"He just doesn't want to get his a** dragged to court," Thomas muttered.

"I'd be happy to anyway, I can't even get into my office thanks to this stupid machine," Sammy added. "The pipes are constantly breaking, ink flooding everywhere! We had to clear the stairs yesterday to even leave our department!"

"That's true," Wally agreed. "Really, we used t' just order ink anyway, and even with this we still have to buy huge quantities of supplies, even if it does mix them for us."

"We can ask Grant about-" Sammy began before the bitter accountant walked up to him.

"You want to know my opinion on the machine?" Grant asked, pushing his glasses up on his face. He held up a few receipts as he continued to speak. "Here's the amount of money we spent before the machine, here's what we spent on the machine, and here's how much it's costing us now, and that's including cleaning supplies and paying Wally and others overtime," he explained as he handed the receipts of to Henry. "Bottom line, we're better off selling it for parts."

Henry read over the receipts then looked at Wally and Thomas. "Well," he began. "You heard the man."

The two smiled and threw open their tool boxes. It looked as though they had been wanting to do this for a long time. Well, that meant they'd enjoy ripping the thing to pieces and maybe they could even use some of the parts for the machines around the studio, the merchandise area needed more parts anyway.

Henry began to leave with Sammy following behind him, scribbling more notes down. He couldn't help but notice how pleased Grant seemed to be to see the machine going as well. Then again, it had been the bane of everyone's career, just about everyone in the building was happy to see it go.

"Any plans for the machine room and the room that was taped up?" Sammy asked, gesturing to the other room as they were about to pass it. The room was creepy, it scared everyone who got within range to see even an inch inside. No one knew what Joey intending with that room, but there was an operation style table inside, several pipes from the machines connecting to the table and other things, and a box that no one dared go near to open.

Henry looked at the room and cringed slightly. This room? He wasn't sure about at all. No one wanted to get even a mile close to it, they only did that because it was connected to the hallway. Everyone was convinced it was meant for something horrible, and even he felt uncomfortable near it. "I was thinking we could change the machine room to an office," he explained calmly. "And the other rooms could be used for different things as well. This room..."

He paused and Sammy looked up to face him. "Henry...?" Sammy asked, lifting an eyebrow in concern at the pause. He looked at the room as well and shuttered, turning away again.

"Go ask Grant if we have enough funds just to board this room up, would ya?" Henry asked with a sigh, turning and walking away. Really, the best thing for that room, was to pretend it didn't exist.

.~.~.~.

It didn't take long for the changes at the studio to be made. Wally and Thomas made quick work of taking down the machine, using some parts to work on the toy machines downstairs, as per Shawn's instructions of what was needed, the rest of the pieces were sold to mechanic shops.

As for the rest of the studio, the pipes from the machine were removed, the holes left by them mostly patched up, and the main creepy room was boarded up so no one even had to look at it anymore. The wall in place of the door wasn't exactly the best, the room could be accessed again if needed, but it did the job of keeping it closed off from the world.

The machine room was easily cleaned up and transformed into an office. And it was a rather nice office anyway for whoever got moved to it. Henry had an idea of who he thought he should move to it but wanted to see where things took him for a little while first before making arrangements.

Through all the work on the studio and even some writing and drawing for the cartoon, Sammy continued to stay by his side. He still continued to write the music and work in the recording rooms a lot, but he had to job of co-running the place as well so he stuck by Henry to help in any way needed.

Henry was working on coming up with new ideas of what to do in the studio, thinking about some new decorations to spruce up the work environment. Currently, the upstairs was decorated predominately with posters from older episodes, some of the posters continued downstairs as well, but the lower the place got, the creepier it got, too.

Further into the studio were 'motivational' posters, reminding employees to keep working, and even further than that was the most disturbing Bendy cutout he had ever seen. A cutout with huge, swirling eyes and a sign that said 'Wandering is a terrible sin', scared the heck out of every employee. He wanted to replace all the creepy things with actually nice things.

"How about more plant life?" Sammy asked, looking at him slightly hopefully from across the desk. "People usually love plants and they really liven up the place. Maybe some nice trees?"

Henry looked at him and laughed. "Alright, you win, we'll put in some small trees," Henry agreed, writing that down while Sammy silently cheered. This was a discussion they had already had several times, and truthfully Henry was okay with it from the start, they were just too busy with other things at the time.

After the three spirits were sent back to Hell, their hosts' true spirit animals had been revealed. Henry didn't know about Susie and Joey, seeing as he hadn't gotten back in contact with them for a while, but he did find out that Sammy's was actually a song bird the entire time. Since they learned that, Sammy wanted to spend more time outside or at least closer to plants and sunshine than he used to, now that the wolf instincts wasn't dominating over the bird instincts.

Henry smiled as he looked at his friend, and now assistant. He lowered his pen and placed his head in his hands, like a professional business man would at a meeting sometimes. "Sammy, I've been meaning to talk to you about some other things regarding the studio..."

.~.~.~.

In a world of fire and perpetual screaming, three figures watched the world of reality as the time slowly passed back. One standing tall and dripping, another, a hellhound, laying peacefully beside him while the third sat upon it's back, feathers slowly falling from her decaying wings.

"Bendy," the fallen angel spoke. "You've been silent for an awful long time. Something's on your mind."

"The same thing that's on everyone's mind," Bendy replied, voice now cold with anger and spite of what happened. " _Revenge_."

Alice smiled wickedly and began to slowly cackle, her hand gently petting the hellhound behind the ears as he looked up and let out a happy howl of agreement. "Those idiot humans will pay dearly," she laughed, her words practically laced with poison.

"Very dearly," Bendy agreed.

~End~

* * *

{~This story was originally finished November 26, 2017. It was a pain for me to write at the time and it's been a further pain for me again but for different reasons, but I'm still mildly pleased with how it turned out. I left it up for a sequel at the time, never got around to that since then, but I could try to write one if anyone wants to see that.

Thanks for reading and tell me how I did on the horror front ^-^ ~}

{~ PS. I had bad panic attacks throughout this, dunno if it's an indicator of horror or not, but sorry if it caused anyone else panic attacks. I tend to have them when reading more 'involved' stories, I spend the entire day going through derealization (Not fully knowing what's real, questioning what's real, feeling out of place). Just mentioning that in hopes that I'm not the only one like this. ~}


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